


Never Look Back

by Nevermore



Category: Dark Angel
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-01-24
Updated: 2012-09-23
Packaged: 2017-10-06 16:21:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nevermore/pseuds/Nevermore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ten years after the siege at Terminal City, Alec is still searching for ways to put the past behind him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. He Who Forgets the Past

**Author's Note:**

> While it's explained in the story, for ease of the reader I'll just state that this takes place ten years after the close of the series. This also has nothing to do with any other story or series I've written in this fandom, though some characterizations may be similar due to the way I as a writer interpret the characters.

"Is this seat taken?" the young woman asked. Alec simply waved an inviting hand in response, never bothering to glance at the beaten-up barstool next to him. He wasn't interested in the alluring female who now hung threateningly close to his personal space. Had she been larger, or male, he would have bothered with a threat assessment; but a petite, mid-twenty-something woman didn't concern him enough to draw his attention away from the scotch in his glass.

_The half-empty glass,_ he noted sadly. _Or half-full._ He was tempted to follow that train of thought but chased it away. It had been years since he'd indulged in the folly of self-analysis, attempting to determine whether he was a pessimist or optimist. _Besides, that's a stupid test,_ he decided. _Half-empty, half-full – it doesn't matter. Half-anything is useless. Half-hearted, half-baked, half-ass, half-done…_ He shook his head, mentally dodging yet another uncomfortable thought. _The_ uncomfortable thought.

_Half- done._ The words teased him, refusing to flee from his alcohol-fueled race toward unconsciousness. Alec was prepared for the words' resilience – he'd been here before, faced this particular challenge. _Half-done._ He drained his glass, raising it with his right hand to get the bartender's attention. He needed a refill. _Half- done… Nope, I'm hardly getting started,_ Alec told himself as he glanced at his watch. 7:30 P.M. _Just another half-hour. Then Jack'll be here._

Jack was the owner's son, a young man who tended bar Monday through Thursday. Alec had learned long ago that it paid to have a favorite bartender and to make certain that the tips let the bartender know how highly he stood in Alec's view of the world. Jack was his favorite, due largely to the fact that he let Alec drink his scotch a bottle at a time, saving him the trouble of needing to ask for a refill every five minutes. Of course, Jack also kept his mouth shut and his eyes down. He respected Alec's privacy; he never asked questions; he never bothered with the usual bartender chitchat bullshit. And for that luxury, Alec would have been willing to have his glass filled half a shot at a time.

"Stay here," Alec muttered to the bartender – he thought the middle-aged guy's name was Barry… or maybe Larry. He tossed back the freshly topped-off glass, and gestured for an immediate refill. Barry/Larry obliged, and then shuffled away to fill a glass of white zinfandel for a young, audaciously effeminate man sitting at the end of the bar.

_Half-done. Half-done._ Alec smiled ruefully. _Jack'll be here soon, and then we'll see who's half-done,_ he threatened his subconscious.

"So what's her name?" Alec heard the young woman next to him ask. He knew she was addressing him – there was no one else close enough to talk to with the bar so sparsely occupied – but he ignored her, hoping she'd do him the service of melting into the earth and leaving him alone.

"Hey, what's her name?" she continued, touching his arm lightly, as if to get his attention. His eyes were upon her the moment her skin touched his jacket, a quick, practiced evaluation intent on proving that she was, in fact, as irrelevant a threat as he'd initially concluded she was.

_No weapons,_ he noted immediately. _And she's small… too small to be a threat._ He simply moved his arm away from her, hoping she'd get the message. Either she didn't or she decided to ignore it.

"She must have burned you pretty bad to make you clam up like this," the woman commented. Alec's only response was to gulp down his scotch and raise his glass again, yearning for the next mouthful of happiness. "And to drink like that," the woman added.

"Go away," Alec muttered, completely uninterested with propriety.

"I don't think you want me to go away," the woman replied.

"I do," Alec assured her. "Take off."

"If you really wanted to be alone, you could just as easily have told me the chair was occupied," she reasoned.

"I would have been lying."

"And is that a problem?"

"Look, miss," Alec spat, whirling to face her, his gaze passing over her again. "I--" He lost his words as he locked eyes on hers, immediately wondering how his first two glances hadn't revealed the sun-bright emeralds that stared back at him. _Those can't be real,_ he reasoned. _They must be contacts or something…_ He searched the edges of her irises but couldn't find the telltale outline of the contact lenses he was certain were present.

"What?" she asked, maintaining her own stare despite a conspicuously self-conscious tone. "What is it?"

"Take off," Alec told her again, tearing his own gaze away, focusing again on his glass. _Twenty-five more minutes,_ he assured himself. _Twenty-five minutes, and Jack'll be here._

"So was it a woman?" the woman asked. "Is that why you're doing the James Dean despondent routine?"

Alec ignored her.

"Because you know, whoever she is, she isn't worth it."

Alec still ignored her.

"In fact, I don't think _anyone's_ worth the kind of devoted drinking you have going on." Alec was amazed that she was still prattling on, as if his requests for privacy had instead been a cry for help. "Just a few months ago, my roommate broke up with her boyfriend, and she was all messed up over it," she continued. "She's from Oregon, has really over-protective parents. Anyway, her boyfriend – his name's Paul – was the first guy she ever slept with. She was all convinced that they'd end up happily ever after or something, but then he dumped her and she totally went wiggins. She started drinking every night, and finally--"

"Why are you still here?" Alec interrupted.

"I'm telling you about my roommate."

"Do I really need to tell you how much I don't give a shit?"

"No, why don't you explain it to me?" the young woman said coolly, once again locking gazes with Alec. This time she was far more confident and confrontational. _I like it,_ Alec decided. _Spunky._ Again he looked her over, and as before when he'd noticed her eyes, he was amazed to find just how much he'd overlooked. _Dark auburn hair, maybe 5'3", 105 lbs. Even though she's sitting down I can tell she's got a nice ass. Definitely a C-cup. And those eyes…_ He was amazed at the entire package and wondered at just what point in the past few years he'd stopped looking at people and started looking only at possible threats.

"I'm Alec," he said with bit of a nod and an almost imperceptible wave.

"Jana," she answered. "Nice to meet you." She smiled broadly, as if she'd just won some incredible prize. "So are you finally gonna tell me?"

"What?"

"What's her name?"

A shudder passed through Alec as he remembered a name from his past. _Just three little letters… It's been what, ten years? I can't believe her name still does that to me._ "There isn't anyone."

Barry/Larry set a Manhattan down in front of Jana, and for a moment Alec was forced to wonder when, and even if, she'd ordered the cocktail. He couldn't remember her having talked to anyone but him. "I don't think you're being completely honest with me," she commented.

"You think I'm lying?" he asked, stupefied to hear a coy, flirtatious tone in his voice.

"Oh, god forbid I accuse you of lying," she said with a mischievous grin, taking a small sip of her drink with her right hand as her left hand went to her shiny auburn bangs, absently stroking her hair out of her eyes.

_She's flirting back!_ Alec realized. _What do I do now?_

"Let's just say I think you're telling half-truths," she added, the grin growing ever wider.

_Half-truths. Half-done. Half-done. You left the job half-done, Alec._ "I have to go," he apologized, quickly getting up and dropping a twenty on the bar. "I'll see ya."

"What?" Jana asked. "Was it something I said?"

Alec didn't answer. He practically darted out the door and set a course for the nearest liquor store. _I didn't want to stay there, anyway,_ he told himself. _I can get drunk just as easily at home, and I won't have to deal with nosy, busy-body chicks._

 

\-------------------------

 

_"You'll never get me to talk," White growled defiantly. Alec locked his gaze with his captive, his face a blank, expressionless mask. For the briefest moment he saw a flash of something – doubt? concern? fear? – in White's eyes. _Must have been my imagination,_ Alec decided._

"I don't expect you to talk," Alec responded coolly. "At least not yet, anyway." He walked around the reinforced, steel chair his Familiar captive was chained to, reassuring himself that White wasn't able to escape. "I don't plan on interrogating you anytime soon."

"Then there's no tactical purpose to holding me," White retorted. "You might as well either let me go or put a bullet in my head." The Familiar sneered contemptuously, but Alec could see through the bravado.

He makes a good show of not being afraid of death, but methinks he doth protest too much,_ Alec thought. "I'm not letting you go," Alec responded. "And though your chances of getting out of here alive are definitely less than stellar, I can't give you the comfort of having a quick end, either."_

"Torture?" White inquired. Alec noticed with admiration that the Familiar didn't really seem frightened.

"Yeah, torture," Alec confirmed solemnly, never noticing that his tone had become so serious, that a part of his mind, for whatever reason, wanted to express some reluctance and guilt at his actions, as if he'd been given no choice. "I am, of course, interested in what you know," Alec admitted, "but there'll be plenty of time for that later. Right now, I just want to hurt you. I want you to scream. I want you to cry. I want you to beg me for forgiveness for all the things you've done to my kind."

"It'll never happen," White muttered.

"Of course it won't," Alec replied with a condescending grin, obviously knowing something his prisoner did not. Sure, he's strong,_ Alec thought. _And he can resist pain, and he's absolutely fanatical in his beliefs, but there's always something . . . that wonderful something unique to every individual. That one, magical thing that will break a man's will. I just have to discover White's something.__

"You underestimate me," White said confidently.

Alec didn't respond. He didn't see any need to. Instead, he simply left the room, giving his prisoner time to think. He's going to wonder,_ Alec knew. _He's going to wonder what kind of things I learned at Manticore. He's going to wonder if maybe he's not as invulnerable as he believes. And most of all, he's going to wonder if there's a limit to what I'm willing to do.__

It was the last part that made Alec grin with satisfaction as he closed the door softly behind him, with as much care as if he was leaving a sleeping baby behind. He was certain that White would break. Because he knew he was willing to do whatever was needed to see it happen.

\-------------------------

The bright, mid-April sun streamed through the window, evoking a painful groan from the depths of Alec's chest. He forced one eye open enough to look at the clock – 1:15. _A.M. or P.M.?_ he wondered for a brief moment. _Oh, right… the sun, he noted. Must be P.M._

He vetoed his body's immediate request for more sleep, certain that if he didn't get out of bed right away he'd likely stay there until it was time to go to the bar. _And that's not much of an option when I have work to do._ Alec had recently done a great deal of thinking about the phrase 'functional alcoholic.' He was not at all convinced that he was, in fact, an alcoholic, but he knew that the large amount of time he spent in bars might seem misleading to potential employers. His solution was to take care of contracts more quickly than most in his profession would. It hadn't taken long to earn the moniker of Mr. Fixit. He was his industry's most in-demand – and high-priced – problem solver in the Pacific Northwest, and he didn't have any plans to lose that distinction.

Alec trudged through his apartment into the kitchen where he found, to his dismay, even more sunlight waiting for him. Needing an instant caffeine jolt but not wanting to put forth the effort of brewing a new pot of coffee, he grabbed yesterday's mug from the sink and poured in the sludge that remained at the bottom of the previous day's pot. He felt it was to his credit that he no longer winced when he drank cold, stale, sewage-thick coffee.

Just two sips were enough to open his eyes fully. _Well, might as well get it over with,_ he decided. He sat down and spilled the contents of a manila envelope onto the chipped, faux wood surface of his kitchen table. _Three pictures, all of the same man. Only one assignment._

He memorized every feature of the face in the pictures and then went to work committing the man's itinerary to memory. _Mr. Jonathan Wagner, COO of Wagner Corp, an up-and-coming pharmaceutical company. 51 years old, divorced twice and currently on wife #3 . . . nice, a 22-year old lingerie model. Three kids, all with wife #1. Into the office at 7 A.M. daily, stays until roughly 8 P.M. Generally goes out for dinner – same restaurants, rotating on a daily schedule. Let's see… Yep, Delmonico's it is,_ Alec decided after reviewing the list of Wagner's favorite restaurants. He could remember spending a weekend with one of the waitresses from Delmonico's a few months earlier. _Of course, that was before she went back to waiting tables…_ He thought a few minutes more before finally deciding that she would likely provide an excellent in. _Now what the hell was her name? Teri? Geri? Sherri?_ None of those names sounded right, but he couldn't remember what her name had been. _I could tell you anything about any inch of that nubile young girl's body, but ask me her name, and I come up blank,_ Alec lamented with a smile. _It's a rough life._


	2. The Past is Sometimes Prelude

_"Can we talk?" Alec asked casually as he walked up to Max._

"Gimme a few minutes," Max answered, never looking up from the paperwork in her hand. Alec knew what it was – daily reports on power usage, ammunition stores, food supplies, and tryptophan rations. It was all incredibly boring, and he was grateful that Max didn't ask him to stick around and go over it all with her. Then again, that would have been unlike her. Lately she'd been growing far more withdrawn, taking everything upon herself. She was afraid to trust anyone else with the burdens of responsibility; she would never be able to look herself in the mirror again if someone she'd trusted with authority went and screwed up.

"I'll be up in the tower," Alec muttered, feigning disappointment that she couldn't talk to him right away. He'd been preparing for this conversation for days, now. Every word, every gesture… they had all been planned. Max had to think of him as an immature, socially inept transgenic when they spoke. She couldn't be permitted to see him as patient and devious.

He walked away quickly, sighing slightly as he went. Once he was in the tower he continued his charade, despite the fact that he was alone. He paced back and forth, openly displaying his irritation at having to wait to ask a simple question. Much later, though far sooner than he'd expected, Max joined him.

"What do you need?" she asked, crossing her arms over her chest, staring at him impatiently. She clearly didn't like that she had to take time out of her schedule for Alec. That would work in his favor.

"I've been thinking about White," he told her. "He's probably the most dangerous single individual out there."

"How do you figure?"

"He's got more information about us than anyone else," Alec reasoned. "He's fought us several times – he knows our strengths, weaknesses, and methods. His position of authority gives him an opportunity to speak about us very publicly."

"Don't worry about White," Max responded calmly. "He'll never do anything too stupid as long as his son is still missing."

"And what if anything ever happens to you?" Alec asked pointedly. Max could only stare blankly in response. It was everything Alec had hoped – this wasn't a problem she'd thought about yet. "You're the only one who knows where Ray is," Alec continued. "If you get killed – not an unlikely possibility with all the sharpshooters aiming at us every minute of every day – then White is probably gonna ask for immediate evidence that someone here knows where his son is. We can't continue to use the kid as a deterrent if we can't produce him."

"And what would you have me do?" Max asked. "It's not like I can just tell everybody here."

"No, but you could tell one or two people," Alec answered.

"Like you?" Max asked with a smile.

"Yeah, right," Alec said, feigning amusement at the suggestion. This was the most difficult part of his plan. It had to be played perfectly. "I was actually thinking Joshua," he explained. "I know he's probably the one you'd like to have take over if anything ever happened to you."

"I don't know…"

"You could tell Mole," Alec added. The flash of concern that passed over Max's face was everything Alec had hoped for. Her thoughts were going exactly where he wanted them to. "A lot of the transgenics listen to him. Especially the freaks. And --"

"Don't call them freaks," Max interrupted. "And besides, maybe Mole isn't the best person to give that kind of information to. He's a little…"

"I know," Alec admitted. "Then tell Joshua. That whole crowd listens to him, too." Max's brow furrowed, and Alec could swear he knew exactly what she was thinking – Sure the freaks listen to Mole, and they'll listen to Joshua… but in the end, even Joshua will listen to Mole. And Mole's too militant. That entire faction is too dangerous to trust with Ray's welfare right now. It has to be someone else…__

"Alec…" Max muttered. He could see it in her eyes – she needed a transgenic to trust, and as much as it was tearing her up inside, she was beginning to realize that Alec was her only real option. He looked directly into her eyes, smiling thinly the way he thought Ben might have. His expression had the desired effect. "If I tell you, you have to keep it a secret. Okay?"

"Don't tell me," Alec objected, his words sounding in his ears like Brer Rabbit screaming, 'Please don't throw me into the briar patch.' He took a step back and looked her over, as if he was searching for some sign of insanity. "I don't want to know, Max. That wasn't my point in any of this. I simply think **someone** should know. But I'm not that someone."

"That's why it has to be you," Max replied, just as Alec knew she would. "Listen, you just have to keep it quiet, okay? Not even Logan has known where Ray is since the first time I had him moved."

"The first time you had him moved?"

"We move him every two weeks," Max explained. "There are Familiars everywhere, and we don't know what they look like. Krit is helping me out on this one – he has Ray under lock and key; and just to make sure no one has much of a chance to stumble across him, we keep him moving."

"Good thinking," Alec commented.

"Right now he's in New Paltz, New York," Max explained. "He's due to be moved in three days. I'll tell Krit you're in on the plan, and he'll get in touch with you. The two of you will come up with some way to keep in touch, some way I won't know about."

"I understand," Alec replied. It was obvious that Max was taking precautions; if she was captured rather than killed, she didn't want to have any idea how Krit and Alec would handle Ray. She couldn't surrender information she didn't have.

 

\-------------------------

 

"Can I help you?" the hostess asked, a disapproving scowl on her face.

"Abe Frohmann, party of one," Alec told her, ignoring her expression. He knew the reason – he didn't exactly look the part of Delmonico's regular clientele. Alec was fulfilling the letter of the dress code, wearing a white dress shirt with a thin, black tie and a black sports jacket, but the faded blue jeans and well-worn combat boots certainly didn't adhere to the spirit of Delmonico's policy. Alec was also well aware that his disheveled hair and several days of stubble didn't help his cause any.

"I'm afraid you do not comply with our dress code," the woman said tactfully.

"Dress code is jacket and tie," Alec replied, pointing to a board behind her. "I have a jacket. I have a tie. If you have a problem with anything else I'm wearing you should've been more specific in your policy."

"I see," she answered hesitantly, glancing away toward her left where a man in a dark blue, pinstripe suit was schmoozing the customers. _The manager,_ Alec guessed. _Maybe I can have a little bit of fun before I work._ He caught sight of Alec and immediately walked over to deal with 'the situation.'__

"Is there a problem?" the manager asked as he approached the podium.

"Not at all," Alec said smoothly. "I was simply having a discussion about your dress code. Apparently, your hostess feels I'm not properly attired."

"Well…" the manager's voice trailed off. He was obviously weighing the situation very carefully in his head. On the one hand, he was hesitant to let a scruffy man like Alec into his four-star restaurant. On the other hand, the manager was calculating the odds of Alec being one of the young computer impresarios who were helping to resurrect Seattle's tech industry. They were all in their twenties, and all were well-known as being unprofessional as hell in their appearance. But they also all spent big and tipped exceedingly well. It wouldn't do to turn away such a customer, especially when he was likely scouting out the restaurant as a possible location for impressing potential clients.

"Perhaps I should go," Alec commented, beginning to turn on his heel just as the manager reached his decision.

"No, that's okay," the man said diplomatically. "You are, of course, abiding by the dress code. I know how it is these days, the young businessmen dressing for comfort more than as a means to impress."

"It is all about the results," Alec said with a friendly smile. "I apologize if I've caused any awkwardness. I'll be more appropriate in the future."

"Oh, that's quite all right," the manager answered. He looked at the seating chart on the podium, deciding to show Alec to his table himself. Alec also took the opportunity to scan the papers on the podium. Next to the seating chart was the reservation list, and as he expected, there was Jonathan Wagner written in at 9:00, party of three, table 17.

"Mickey?" Alec whirled to his left, knowing that the melodious female voice was directed at him. He recognized the woman walking up to him, but he still couldn't remember her name. Thankfully, she got close enough for him to read her nametag before there was too much of an awkward silence. _Keri! Of course – Keri. How could I have forgotten?_

"Hey," he said with a half-wave. "I didn't know you worked here," he lied.

"What are you doin' here?" she asked.

"Scouting restaurants," he told her, also glancing at the manager out the corner of his right eye. The smile on the man's face told Alec all he needed to know – the man was congratulating himself for having figured out Alec's business. He was now very thankful he'd decided to let Alec in.

"If it would be possible to sit in Keri's section…" Alec said.

"Of course," the manager replied.

"But you have to call me Abe Frohmann tonight," Alec told Keri, adding a roguish wink for good measure. "I'm incognito."

"Abe Frohmann?" Keri asked with a giggle. "The sausage king of Chicago?"

"That's me," Alec beamed, appreciating Keri's knowledge of pre-Pulse American cinema.

"Great," Keri laughed. Then she turned to her boss. "Table eighteen will be leaving pretty soon. You can give that one to Mickey… I mean, Abe." Again the laugh. Alec knew he was in like Flint.

"Just give me a few minutes to have a table cleared," the manager said graciously.

"I'll just wait at the bar," Alec commented. "It'd be nice to get some Blue Label to help me unwind." He knew that comment would lay to rest any of the manager's remaining doubts. Johnny Walker Blue Label would go for over fifty dollars a glass, and Alec planned to drop a c-note to pay for it. The rest of the evening he would get anything he wanted.

 

\-------------------------

 

_"Hey Mickey," Crystal cooed as she walked over and grabbed Alec in a tight hug. "It's been far too long."_

"I was here three nights ago," Alec replied, taking a step back, admiring Crystal's body through her see-through top and fishnet shorts. God, I so adore strippers…__

"Three whole nights," Crystal shot back, a seductive pout spreading across her lips. "You missed the new girl's first night."

"The new girl?" Alec was fully aware that he'd failed to hide his curiosity, but that was fine. He knew the drill – the more curious he seemed, the more quickly he'd get to meet the new girl. It was one of the best perks of being a co-owner of the club. The world might have been going to hell in a hand basket, but money still talked. Investing in a strip club provided him with a steady source of income and a constant source of amusement. And the best part is that since I'm just an investor, I don't have to do any of the work,_ he reminded himself, marveling at the wonders of capitalism._

Crystal winked over to Chanice, who immediately walked over to the corner table to clear it for Alec. There were four college-aged guys sitting there, but Chanice made certain they surrendered their choice view. All it took was offering a closer look in one of the Champagne Rooms.

The table was cleared and wiped down by the time Alec and Crystal crossed the club, and Melody was waiting to take his order. "Beam and Coke," Alec muttered as he leaned back in his chair, settling into the surrounding shadows as his gaze fell on Jasmine onstage.

He always enjoyed Jasmine's show. The club had several poles for the dancers, but Jasmine had a habit of climbing all the way to the top of the highest one, about twenty feet off the floor, and then hanging upside down for a few moments before sliding down, inverted, and stopping on a dime with her head a few inches from the floor. It was an act that always drew a gasp or two from first-time patrons.

She caught sight of Alec within a few moments of her death-defying dive, and danced over seductively, discreetly showing off the ankle bracelet that he'd given her the last time he'd been in. She always showed gratitude for the gifts she received – that was another thing he liked about her. She wasn't just in it for the money, taking everything she could get her hands on and then treating him like dirt the way some of the girls did. She seemed genuinely nice. Polite. He hoped the new girl was the same way.

"Hey, Mickey," Jasmine said with a broad smile as she got into earshot. "How ya doin'?" She locked her eyes onto his, drawing his gaze away from her body and onto her face. Such powerful eyes, he noted for the umpteenth time. And she really knows how to use them. I can't believe she's happy just being a stripper. She could be so much more…__

"So when are ya gonna take me up on my offer?" he asked her, just as he always did.

"College?" she asked, her long black hair falling over her mocha skin, hiding her eyes. "I'm not going to college, Mickey. I've told you that a bazillion times."

"You're breakin' my heart," Alec replied.

"Come home with me tonight and I'll break far more than just your heart," she teased. Alec had heard that Jasmine liked her sex rough, and he'd always been tempted to take her up on her frequent offers. But not her,_ he decided again, just as he always did. _Not with that hair. That skin. It's all too familiar…__

His miserable reverie was interrupted as the music ended and a new face walked up to join the two of them. "This is Amethyst," Jasmine said with a flourish of her hand, introducing the new girl.

"Hey," Alec muttered, his eyes poring over the woman who slowly started to dance in front of him, hesitantly picking out the beat of the new song. I can tell she's new at this,_ Alec decided. _She's still getting a feel for the job. Probably not at all jaded yet, either.__

Alec looked her over, marveling at how much she looked like a character that stepped out of an anime movie. The crazy-looking, eggplant-dyed hair, the purple eyes, the alabaster skin, the incredibly thin figure that still has a nice rack…_ As he sat in his corner throughout the night, Alec watched girls come and go onstage, but his eyes remained riveted on Amethyst while she was dancing, and wandered aimlessly, uninterested in anything in the room, when she was between acts._

It was four in the morning when the last of the patrons finally left, allowing Ted to close the club for the night. Alec was well and truly drunk by that point.

"You okay getting home tonight?" Ted called out, just as he always did. Alec knew the manager didn't give a rat's ass whether he was actually okay or not – he was only covering himself, making certain he checked on potentially intoxicated customers in his club before they climbed in behind the wheel of a car.

"Fuck off, Ted," Alec groused. "You know I'm fine."

"I'll take care of him," Jasmine said as she walked over. Or actually, I guess her name is Maria now,_ Alec reminded himself. The dancing was over, and the women had all returned to the safety and security of their secret identities, the majority of them preparing to Clark Kent it through their daytime jobs or college classes until they returned to the club the next night._

"I'm fine," Alec insisted. "Really."

"Hey, if you're not interested in me taking you home, that's your problem," Maria smirked. "You know it's an open offer."

"I know," Alec responded, mustering one of his rare, genuine smiles. He fought his way to his feet and lumbered toward the front door, grateful that his bladder seemed capable of holding out until he got home. The club's bathroom was beyond rank by the end of the night, and Alec wasn't even willing to risk his genetically enhanced immune system to the filth that the shadiest denizens of Seattle brought in with them on a nightly basis.

"You're not driving, are you?" Alec heard a vaguely familiar voice ask as he trudged through the back door and into the employees' parking lot behind the club. He looked up and saw Amethyst staring at him from a group of four girls who'd all left together a few minutes earlier.

"I would if I could remember what my car looked like," Alec jested. Amethyst smiled. Her face lit up in a way it hadn't onstage, and Alec realized he'd found a second dancer who just didn't belong in his club. She could do better than that,_ he told himself, ignoring his subconscious's questions about why he should even care at all._

"Why don't you let me give you a ride home," she offered, pointing to a sharp looking Mitsubishi Serpent. Nice wheels,_ Alec noted. _No wonder she has to dance. The payments on that must be murder.__

"Quit schmoozing the owner," Diane joked. "It won't make a difference anyhow. He doesn't mix with us commoners."

"I'd prefer to walk," Alec grumbled to Amethyst, ignoring Diane's words. As if the heavens themselves had decided to intervene, a flash of lightning lit the sky a few miles off. Alec immediately started counting. 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10-11…_ Thunder rolled softly, and Alec cursed his luck. He hated the rain. Or, more to the point, he hated getting rained on. He was pretty much fine with the rain as long as he was inside, but the sensation of having rain fall on his head was always unpleasant for him. He figured the edge of the storm was roughly two or three miles away. If it came in his direction, he'd never get home without getting drenched._

"You sure about walking?" Amethyst continued. "You'll get wet." It was as if she knew exactly what words to say, and Alec found himself helpless to resist her offer.

"Fine," he said, punctuating his surrender with an exasperated sigh. He walked over to her silver car and climbed in. "So what's your name, anyway?" he asked. "I can't really call you Amethyst out in the real world."

"I guess not," she agreed as she turned the ignition, the engine roaring to life before settling down into a satisfied purr. "My name's Keri."


	3. Repeating Past Mistakes

Alec sighed heavily behind the wheel of his stolen pickup truck. He'd been weighing the merits of his two options for over twenty minutes, trying to make a decision and wondering why it was so hard for him.

_This has never been an issue before,_ he reminded himself. _What's my drama?_

Again he considered his alternatives – _wait out here or go inside?_ He knew Wagner was likely more relaxed inside, that his routine of eating at Delmonico's on a regular basis would make him feel comfortable, that the familiar surroundings would give him the illusion of security. _That's a definite plus._

Outside, though, there were fewer witnesses, fewer innocent bystanders that might get in the way of his work. _God knows I hate an audience. Besides, I could lay one hell of an ambush out here… though he and his guards might be more alert for an attack once they're back out in the open._

_Eeny, meeny, mieny, moe…_ He continued to think, suddenly suspecting that there may, in fact, be something else at work in his mind, something he wasn't consciously aware of; try as he might, once the possibility presented itself, he couldn't chase it away. _Goddamnit… it's Keri. What the hell is wrong with me, anyway?_

Alec opened the door and stepped out onto the rain-slicked pavement. _My employer wants to make a statement, and the best way to do that is by having as many witnesses as possible. There's only one right way to do this, whether I like it or not._

He fought to relax as he pulled down the front of his ski mask and walked briskly toward the front door. A middle-aged man with a nineteen, maybe twenty-year old woman was exiting just as Alec reached the entrance; both man and woman diverted their gazes toward the sidewalk as Alec moved into arm's reach, each of them obviously wanting to make sure that they weren't mistaken for someone who gave a damn what Alec was up to. America was well on its way to full recovery, but that didn't mean people had forgotten all of the lessons they'd learned shortly after the Pulse. _Never invite trouble. Never be a hero. Look out for yourself at all costs._

Alec's body rotated slightly toward the left as he passed the man in the doorway, but he never broke stride. His entrance elicited a gasp from the hostess, but she also immediately found something – anything – to draw her attention away from what she instinctively knew was a man who wouldn't hesitate to kill her if she interfered.

The transgenic's pace quickened as he passed the first few tables, continuing on his way toward Wagner's usual table 17. His target was fully distracted by his onion soup au gratin, but his doubtlessly expensive bodyguard was quick to react. He'd almost brought his weapon to bear by the time Alec pulled the trigger. _Damn fast for an ordinary,_ the transgenic thought as he pulled the trigger. _A hell of a waste, really._

The report from Alec's weapon cracked through the cozy confines of the dining room, instantly driving many guests under their tables in fear while most simply stared passively, seemingly unable to process what was going on. The door to the kitchen opened, and Alec trained his weapon on… Keri. _She's looking right at me,_ he cursed silently. His instincts told him to pull the trigger, to remove the potential obstacle and witness, but he ignored that advice and instead put a bullet into the head of Wagner's second guard. The fairly vulnerable man had been seated with his back to the entrance as he watched the kitchen door. His only warning had been his partner's attempt to draw his 9mm, and the two seconds of delay in his reaction were far more than enough time for Alec to kill the first guard, catch sight of Keri and weigh the merits of killing her, then turn back to the business at hand.__

The second bodyguard's death was as brutally quick as the first's. One bullet to the head, the hollow-tip 10mm round spraying gray matter across the wall. By that point Wagner's mind had registered what was going on, and he gazed curiously at his executioner, a deer in the headlights. Alec didn't react at all – his employer had sent no message, no instructions to let Wagner know who it was who'd killed him. That was rare. Most people who retained Alec's services were slaves to narcissism; it wasn't enough to win – they had to gloat. It'd never made much sense to the transgenic. He'd always resented having to take the extra time to deliver a message to a victim who would never be able to make use of the information.

Three shots for Wagner, one in the heart and two in the head. Then Alec was moving again. As he'd expected, no one made a move to stop him. There were plenty of other bodyguards in the restaurant, the majority of them ex-cops and ex-soldiers, but they all had their own responsibilities. As long as Alec left them alone, they were perfectly happy to count their lucky stars that he hadn't come for their employers that night.

A sudden downpour had seemingly come out of nowhere during the few moments Alec was inside, and he muttered angrily at the weather as he walked over to his stolen pickup truck and drove away into the night. There was no police response to evade – they knew enough to recognize a report regarding a professional hit, and none of them was going to risk his life. They'd be along in about five minutes, once they could be certain that the assassin had enough of a chance to make a safe escape.

Alec turned on the radio and hummed tunelessly to the music that came on, not even remotely in sync with the song he'd never heard before. All that mattered to him was the job. The success. At least for a few minutes, his life had had purpose again; he'd been useful to someone. And the best part was the payment that would be waiting for him in his Cayman Islands account the next morning.

\-------------------------

Fourteen in a row, _Alec congratulated himself as he landed the six of diamonds in the Seattle Mariners cap lying nine feet and four inches away. He'd never run up his streak this far from this range, and according to the rules of his game, one more made shot and he could increase the distance to nine feet and five inches._

He took the next card – the ten of clubs – from the top of the deck and grasped it lightly between his thumb and first two fingers. "Easy as pie," he muttered happily. "Fade, fire, and for--"

"Alec, you in there?" Max called from outside his door. The disruption was just enough to send his shot awry.

"Damnit, Max," Alec hissed. He got to his feet and trudged grumpily across the room. He opened the door and immediately pounced. "I had fourteen," he told her. "I was in the middle of shooting for fifteen. You know how hard that is, especially with the cross-wind I have today?" he asked, pointing to the open window that was allowing a light but unpredictably intermittent zephyr to waft in.

"Sorry," Max apologized weakly. She knew about Alec's games; she knew they were, perhaps, the only things that kept him from bugging her every other hour with some trivial matter for her to deal with. "I can come back later."

"No, come on in," Alec offered, a new thought occurring to him. "You can play me. How 'bout a nickel a shot?"

"What are you up to?" Max asked, trying to gauge the distance from the wall to the cap. "That's about nine and a half feet, right?"

"Nine feet, four inches," Alec announced proudly.

"And you got fourteen in a row?"

"Yup."

"Forget it," Max said with a smile. "I had enough trouble at seven-ten. I'll send Joshua up in a bit, though. He's always up for a good game."

"And he's also broke," Alec pointed out. "Won't make any money playing him."

"And from what I've seen around here lately, it's not exactly like there's anywhere to spend your winnings."

"For now, at least," Alec replied. "We'll get out of here eventually, and then it'll be party time."

"You really think we'll get out?" Max asked, a trace of something – Is that hopelessness?_ Alec wondered – creeping into Max's voice. She leaned back against the wall and curled her legs up beneath her as she sat on the floor._

"You have any doubts?" Alec responded, sitting down a few feet from her.

"It's been six months," Max muttered, now sounding unmistakably despondent. "I don't know anymore…"

"Well I do," Alec assured her, "and we're getting out eventually. Haven't you seen the pro-transgenic protesters?" he asked, referring to the group that started showing up daily at the gates just a few weeks earlier. "They're getting more impatient, and numerous, every day."

"You really think we'll get out?" she repeated.

"I'm sure of it," Alec told her. "The last obstacle we have is White."

"It always comes back to him," Max remarked miserably. "He spreads lies and misinformation and there's nothing we can do about it."

"Unless we get some proof about his people, about their goal to wipe out humanity," Alec pointed out. This was the same thing he said every time Max got like this. At first he'd been surprised at how incredibly depressed she could become. Then he'd read some information that X5s occasionally suffered from more chemical imbalances than just a lack of tryptophan. Their brains also sometimes seemed to temporarily cut off production of serotonin, as well. There was no apparent rhyme or reason to it, and those with the condition were given to severe bouts of depression. The disorder had never been confirmed in Max, but Alec had his suspicions.

"We've been through this a hundred times," Max muttered. "The only way to prove what the Familiars are up to is to get someone high up, someone who actually knows enough to expose their plans. I've led us into a trap, and we're all gonna die here. This is all so impossible."

"It's possible."

"I don't see how... Maybe if we knew who those people are," Max responded. "We don't even know that much, and I can't see any of the ones we've encountered being forthcoming with that kind of information."

"We just haven't found anyone yet," Alec said encouragingly. "We already know that Sandeman was against some of the cult's plans. There have to be others, too. There have to be some Familiars who'd be willing to help us. All we have to do is wait long enough for them to get a chance to contact us."

"And until then we remain stuck here," Max growled. "Trapped. Like… rats."

"I prefer to think of us more as caged tigers, thank you very much," Alec countered. "It's a better metaphor."

"Maybe… but I'm not so sure you'd look all that good with stripes," Max answered, an unexpected smile brightening up her face. And like that, her melancholy evaporated like rain in the desert.

"Well I'd certainly look better with stripes than you would with a rat's tail," Alec said with a smile of his own.

"I'm not so sure I like you pondering the image of me with a tail," Max grinned.

"Oh, here we go again. For the last time, I didn't mean it like that," Alec groused. "Why do you say stuff like that?" He was smiling broadly, but his question was still half-serious.

"Like what?" Max asked innocently.

"You **know** like what. You make it sound like I'm hitting on you."

"Oh, and you weren't?" Max teased.

"You know I wasn't."

"But you hit on every other woman in Terminal City," Max pointed out. "Even the fuzzy ones."

"When have I ever hit on the fuzzy ones?"

"Just a few nights ago I saw you hitting on that one… what's her name… Nymeria?"

"No I didn't," Alec objected.

"Yes you did!" Max insisted. "On Tuesday night."

"Oh, that doesn't count."

"Why not?"

"Two reasons," Alec explained. "First, I was drunk and therefore my judgment was impaired. Second, I was so drunk that I don't even remember doing it, so it shouldn't count."

"If we shouldn't count anything that you do when you're drunk, then you wouldn't get credit for much of anything," Max said with a wicked grin. For the briefest moment Alec wondered if she was making a thinly veiled insult, but her joking tone convinced him that she was not.

"You overlook the fact that some of my finest moments have been when I'm drunk."

"So I hear," Max said, her grin growing into a full smile.

"And what's **that** supposed to mean?"

"Kelly's my roommate," Max said.

"So?"

"She talks in her sleep," Max explained. "Apparently you're… how did she put it… you're her lord and master."

"Oh."

"That's all you have to say?" Max asked, her smile somehow growing even wider. Alec began to wonder if Max had more teeth than most people.

"I don't kiss and tell," Alec said smoothly.

"Yes you do!" Max objected. "You and Sketchy talk all the time."

"One of these days, Max…"

"What… you gonna be **my** lord and master, Alec?" Max asked, not bothering to suppress a mocking chuckle.

"Exactly how did you become our leader, again?"

"I look better on television," Max replied.

"That's your one qualification?" Alec asked.

"Don't hate because I'm beautiful."

"We're doomed."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Max replied sarcastically. She got to her feet and reached down to help Alec up, too. "Let's get going."

"Where?"

"Outside," Max told him. "You should let that breeze blow on you under the warm sun. Days like this are rare enough as it is; no reason to waste them sitting in here tossing cards into a cap.

"Lead the way." Alec took her hand and got to his feet, following closely on Max's heels as he marveled at how easily she shook off her depression and doubt.

\-------------------------

A light, insistent tapping woke Alec from a dreamless sleep. His first thought was that the police had found him, that they wanted to have a nice little chat about his activities the previous night. Once his mind shook off slumber enough to undertake rational thought, though, he realized how foolish a fear that was. The police were extremely unlikely to go looking for a professional hitman, and if by chance they did put their lives on the line like that, S.W.A.T. would be first through the door. This was someone else.

He stayed in bed, hoping that his uninvited visitor would go away, but the tapping continued, unfaltering and constant. _Whoever it is is gonna get his ass kicked._

Alec forced his tired, hung-over body into motion as he rose from the bed and lumbered toward the front door, grabbing his 10mm from the coffee table as he trudged through the living room. "Who is it?" he asked from five feet away from the entrance.

"Keri. Open up, will ya? I've been out here for, like, ten minutes. Your neighbor's already opened his door and scowled at me twice."

Without even stopping to wonder why he was complying, Alec opened the door and settled his gaze on his guest. Keri's eyes went directly to his pistol, and Alec clumsily – and far too late – moved his right hand behind his back to conceal the weapon.

"That looks familiar," she commented as she breezed past him, placing a small waxed paper bag on the coffee table and walking into the kitchen. "You have any coffee?"

"Bottom shelf, cabinet next to the fridge," Alec answered dumbfoundedly, wondering at the situation. He actually took a moment to pinch himself, to make sure he wasn't dreaming. "It's a new bag," he added.

"Hazelnut," Keri said happily. "My favorite." Alec had barely managed to close the front door – and was still a virtual statue by the apartment's entrance – by the time Keri had ground the beans, started the pot of coffee, and walked back out to face him. "Donuts in the bag," she said with a gesture toward the coffee table. "Jelly, glazed, and toasted coconut. Didn't know what you'd like."

"Jelly's fine," Alec murmured, finally regaining his senses as Keri sat down on the battered leather couch.

"So what, you all hung over?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"Isn't that just a little melodramatic?" she asked with a coy smile. "Go out, do a job, then drown your guilt with a few stiff drinks?"

"Bottle and a half of Beam."

"Okay, so we're well past a few stiff drinks," Keri responded with a grim nod. "That's really not healthy, you know."

"Who the hell are you?" Alec asked, relieved that he felt his senses returning to him. "And what are you doing here?"

"I'm Keri, but you already know that. And as for what I'm doing here… well, this is kinda awkward… I was hoping you could teach me to do what you do."

"Huh?"

"I saw you last night," Keri said evenly, eerily calmly.

"Oh yeah? Where was that?" Alec asked, instinctually evasive.

"At Delmonico's," Keri told him. Alec's stomach sank in response.

_A damn witness,_ he cursed silently, knowing that he really had no alternative to eliminating Keri. It was a job requirement. "Go away and never come back," he muttered under his breath, giving in to a weak voice in the back of his mind calling for a measure of mercy.

"Mickey, please…"

"Go away," he repeated more loudly, more insistently.

"I'm not going anywhere," Keri answered, crossing her arms stubbornly. "I came here to learn from you."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he shot back, noting with chagrin that his right hand was hanging at his side, the 10mm once again in plain sight.

"I'm a waitress and an occasional stripper," she answered. Alec noted the fact that she said "stripper" instead of "dancer." "I want something better. I _deserve_ something better."

"And exactly how do you feel contract killer is a step up?"

"Better money, better hours."

"Sure," he replied glumly. "Be a contract killer – meet new and interesting people… and blow their heads off."

"You tellin' me it doesn't pay well?"

"What do you think?" Alec asked with a sarcastic flourish around at his surroundings. He hoped the run-down apartment would help deter any further interest. _And of course I won't mention the fact that I have millions in investments and offshore accounts._

"So you don't advertise the fact that you have money," Keri said. "Makes sense not to attract attention; but don't think I'm gonna believe that you don't have a nest egg or two somewhere. Don't forget I know full well you own a good chunk of the club I used to work at."

"Who the hell are you?" he asked again

"Just Keri," she repeated.

"Just Keri…" Alec's mind raced along as he searched for something else to say. _Well, she's obviously made me… I can't let her walk out of here. Unless…_

"Just give me a chance," she suggested. "See how well I do."

"What makes you think you'd be any good at… at what I do?"

"I'm smart," Keri replied with a mischievous grin.

"That's it?" Alec asked. "You're not gonna go on about military experience, a black belt or two, or some crap like that?"

"I'm smart," Keri repeated. "I'm smart enough to learn what I have to learn. Smart enough to be careful on the job and not make mistakes. Smart enough to do what you tell me until you think I'm ready to work on my own."

_Well, she's certainly saying all the right things,_ Alec noted. In his opinion, intelligence was the most important asset for someone in his line of work. Having a wide array of combat skills was nice, but there was always someone who was a better hand-to-hand combatant, a better shot, a better explosives expert. Being smart, though, that was the key. Intelligence kept one from taking stupid risks, from being foolish enough to try a job without being completely in control of the situation. _It also makes someone capable of learning what I have to teach,_ he decided.

"Fine," Alec finally muttered wearily. "I can't believe I'm doing this, but fine. And from now on, call me Alec, okay." Keri nodded, and he continued. "Come back in a few hours, after I have time to drink some coffee and get a shower."

"Hey, I'm the one who made the coffee," Keri pointed out. "I think I should get at least some of it. And as for the shower, well… what if you need someone to wash your back?"

"Fine," Alec relented all too easily, cheered and instantly awakened by the prospect of taking a shower with Keri. _Don't even think about continuing any kind of involvement with her,_ his instincts warned him. He ignored the warning, though.

_I won't get too close,_ he assured himself. _I didn't fall for her last time we got together for a brief – though passionate – weekend, and I won't fall for her now, either. There's nothing to worry about._


	4. Returning to the Old Routine

The gentle beeping of the alarm clock coming from the closed bedroom reminded Alec that he should look busy. He'd been in the middle of cleaning his Barret sniper rifle when his mind started to wander, taking in the unfamiliar surroundings of a clean kitchen. It took Keri three days to clean up the dirty, battered apartment, but she'd insisted. She assured Alec that there was no way she could concentrate on her training when she was surrounded by a disaster area of a home. _Well, at least she's well-ordered,_ Alec told himself. What he hadn't expected was the eerie rapport that had developed between them by the time Keri finished her cleaning and redecorating project.

Alec felt more comfortable with her than he'd felt with anyone in a long time. _Not since…_ He cut off that train of thought immediately and turned back to the task at hand. He shined his penlight down the long barrel of the weapon, his eyes poring over the rifling, checking the bore for any sign of wear and tear, any barely perceptible cracks or scratches. As he'd expected, it was fine.

The rifle was completely reassembled by the time Keri opened the bedroom door and tenuously stepped out into the living room, glancing over at him with her typical incredulous morning glare. "Seriously, this whole not sleeping thing is weird," she told him. "I've been here for a week and you've slept a grand total of maybe six or seven hours. It's not good for you."

"I'll be fine," Alec assured her, just as he had the day before, and the day before that. "I've already told you about a dozen times – I just don't sleep much. Never have, and I guess I never will."

"You're a bit of a freak if you ask me," Keri responded with a playful grin. Despite her simple teasing intent, Alec was not amused.

"Don't ever call me that," he told her caustically, stopping her dead in her tracks as she looked at him with alarm.

"What? What did I say?" She looked so innocent, so abashed, that Alec almost felt bad for using the tone of voice he had.

"_Freak_," he spat. "Don't _ever_ call me that. In fact, don't ever even say that word. Okay?"

"Okay."

Alec noticed her take an almost imperceptible fraction of a step back; he knew he'd frightened her, and he felt strangely fine with that. _As long as she gets the message._ "Anyway, you'd better get out there for your run," he told her, his voice suddenly calm, almost friendly. "We have a lot to do today."

"Sure," she muttered.

Alec's mood changed immediately, and he found himself incredibly proud of his new protégé. They were four days into training, and Keri had gone from a waitress with no exceptionally intense workout regimen to a woman who now ran eight miles a day, followed that with weight training, and then rounded out her workout with some aerobics and martial arts. He knew her body had to be aching all over, that her feet were covered with blisters, and that the simple act of getting out of bed and walking into the living room was likely more agonizing than anything she had ever experienced; but she did it, and without a word of complaint. Just as she'd promised him, she was smart enough to do what he told her without question.

"You gonna join me this morning?"

"No, I already went running," Alec lied. The truth was that he simply assumed that he would be able to run eight miles in record time if he ever had to, though it had been years since he'd pushed his body with any real training. He'd decided long ago that it was enough to rely on his transgenic enhancements to get him by. _Lydecker would have called me lazy,_ he admitted to himself. _I'd just say I'm practical. No reason to spend all that time training. It's unnecessary._

"You gonna teach me how to use that when we're done with the workouts today?" Keri added, looking at the huge rifle that lay on the table.

"We'll see," he told her, chasing away the thought that she was likely so sore she wouldn't be able to lift the weapon, no less learn how to use it. "I might start you with an AR-15 or something else first. Smaller, less recoil."

"You don't think I can handle that?"

"Don't know," Alec responded. "But I don't think starting you with a Barret is much smarter than starting a 16-year old with a Ferrari as his first car."

"Point taken," Keri said, relenting. Alec liked how she always accepted his word as final. He'd been worried that once they started she would start acting like she knew best how to proceed with her training. Thankfully, that was not the case.

"What time do I have to beat today?" she asked him, seemingly unafraid of the daunting task of besting her running time every day, no matter how sore she became.

"1 hour, 26 minutes, 37 seconds."

"Then I'll see ya in 1 hour, 25 minutes."

\-------------------------

Alec stood in the entryway of his apartment, needing only a moment to confirm that Keri had failed her test. He strode into the living room and settled his gaze on her, sitting right at the edge of the couch.

"You moved."

"No I didn't," Keri protested. "You told me to sit right here until you got back. "I'm still at the same spot on the couch."

"My instructions were a bit more specific than that," Alec chided softly, more disappointed than angry. "I let you get into as comfortable a position as you wanted, and I told you not to move until I got back. I told you that under no circumstances were you to move; no matter what happened or how long I was gone."

"And I'm right here where you left me," Keri pointed out, though her tone let Alec know her effort was only for show. She knew full well that she'd failed.

"I was gone for just over thirty hours," Alec continued. "There isn't a wet spot on the couch, so I know you at least moved to go to the bathroom."

"Didn't think you'd want me messing up your furniture."

"There's a new couch getting delivered today," he answered. "On the off chance that you'd done as you were told. The pillow at the other end of the couch is moved, too. You laid down to sleep."

"Sorry."

"I was telling you just two days ago that your training with the sniper rifle is about far more than just being a good shot."

"Which I am."

"Yes, you're an excellent shot," Alec admitted. "But being a sniper is a state of mind. You have to be patient, and I don't mean like normal people are patient. You have to be obsessive about it. You have to be willing to sit on a couch without moving for thirty hours if that's what you need to do to get your shot. You have to be willing to urinate on yourself. You have to be able to fight off sleep for the entire duration. You have to block out everything but the shot that will end your period of immobility. You understand?"

"Yes."

"Good." Alec remembered his time in Gillette, how Lydecker would treat his charges when they'd made a mistake similar to Keri's. It was not a pleasant memory; and while Alec refused to visit upon his protégé the same kind of cruel incentives encouraging perfection, he likewise had to admit that negative reinforcement could be a potent motivator. "Go for your run," he told her. "But go through the course twice."

"That's sixteen miles."

"I know."

"I got, like, maybe four hours of sleep last night."

"You weren't supposed to get any sleep last night."

"So this is punishment?"

"You think you deserve to be rewarded?"

Keri's defeated look was all the answer Alec needed. She walked directly to the door, avoiding eye contact and grabbing her sweatshirt off the closet doorknob as she left.

\-------------------------

_"Good morning, sunshine," Alec said with a grin, locking gazes with his prisoner._

"It's not morning," Ames responded weakly. His voice no longer contained any arrogance; gone was the bravado, the superiority, and the ironclad resolve that had been so ever-present during Ames White's time of freedom. Alec had seen to that.

Three times a day for three straight days he had visited the Familiar and tortured him until he passed out from the pain. The first day had been the toughest, when Ames was still full of spit and vinegar, willing to endure pain in silence rather than give his captor the satisfaction of a wince or moan, no less a scream. That changed, eventually, as Special Agent Ames White learned firsthand some of the punishments the transgenics had experienced back at Manticore. Deep down, Lydecker had always had a soft spot for 'his kids,' but some of the other instructors had been more lavish in doling out discipline. Alec had always hated those particular men and women – soldiers and scientists who seemed to delight in devising methods of actually hurting a transgenic. Now Alec used many of their techniques on his captive, trying not to dwell on how much he'd picked up over the years and just how easy he found it to inflict agony on another.

The first session had been a plain and simple beating as Alec allowed himself the satisfaction of smacking White's grin right off his face. The hard part had been showing enough restraint to avoid breaking his jaw or giving him a concussion. He needed White coherent and able to communicate. Interrogation would ultimately be rather pointless, otherwise.

The second session introduced White to the experience of having every bone in his left hand broken, one at a time, under the fairly precise force of a ball-peen hammer. Alec had to admit that he'd been impressed by White's strength of will during that session – even after two compound fractures in his index finger and with his hand a bruised, bloody, mangled mess, he kept his composure. He didn't pass out from the pain, he didn't beg for mercy, and he didn't look away from his injuries. That was the one and only session Alec considered a failure.

By the time he'd gone in for his next session eight hours later, though, Alec was satisfied with his progress. Ames was definitely a little woozy from the pain and he was consciously struggling against going into shock. Alec had cleaned up the Familiar and set the fingers in splints. The sole exception was the index finger – Alec wasn't sure he'd be able to prevent infection at the fracture points, so he simply cut the digit off and sewed up the wound. The pain was enough to cause Ames to pass out, and Alec had been left in silence to patch up his prisoner enough to ensure he'd be as strong as possible for the start of the second day.

That second day was Alec's favorite. Three excruciating, hour-long sessions of electro-shock therapy ground down Ames' will. Alec had always been fond of electricity, due to the fact that the human body was unable to deal effectively with that particular stimulus. Even fairly innocuous, low-voltage shocks over-loaded human pain receptors, causing the subject to feel he was experiencing far more electricity than he actually was. That allowed the transgenic to zap his captive repeatedly, holding back from serious jolts until he was ready to wrap up the session.

By the time the third day came along, White was already a fraction of his former self. He still talked the talk, but Alec doubted he could walk at all. With the exhausted Familiar's pain receptors still screaming from the previous day's activities, Alec undertook the final course in his three-day physical torture program – burn day. The morning started with fire, the afternoon brought cold, and the late-night acid and alkaloid session gave Ames his first real experience with chemical burns. Then it got really nasty.

Alec dragged White from the makeshift torture chamber and into the carefully constructed interrogation room, strapping him into a small steel chair that was hardly large enough to accommodate the Familiar's rump. The seat was slanted slightly toward the right so that Ames was constantly sliding, ever so slowly, toward the floor. It was designed to be uncomfortable, to make it impossible for the individual to center his weight. It was also too short, pretty much forcing the user to keep his feet on the floor, which was the last thing Ames wanted – the floor around the chair was charged, and he received an electric shock every time he made contact with the tiles.

Alec strapped his prisoner into the chair, adjusting the armrests so that they were at just the right height to allow Ames to fall out of the chair and onto the floor. Then he left, setting the lights in the room to flash, blindingly bright, every fifteen seconds. Ames White endured the room for two days, and then Alec visited only long enough to hook his prisoner up to an I.V. that provided fluids and nutrients; it would keep the Familiar alive but was nowhere near enough to allow him to start recovering.

On the third day in the interrogation room, Alec started blaring the sound of an infant's cries over the speakers. Human beings were hard-wired to react to that sound; any other sound in the environment could be blocked out – the rumble of a train near a house, frequent emergency vehicle sirens, traffic from an adjacent highway – but no matter how often an infant cried, no human being could become acclimated to the sound. It was a primal drive that all humans – even the Familiars – retained from the earliest days of their evolutionary development. While such a drive served a very obvious practical purpose, it also provided Alec with the stimulus he needed to continually prevent Ames from sleeping. The strobes flashed and the infant screamed, over and over, each one alternating with the other, for days. All to build up to this, Alec thought happily.

"Good morning sunshine," Alec repeated, ignoring the Familiar's protestations about the time of day.

"Good morning," Ames answered, this time giving Alec exactly what he wanted. That was the chip in the wall, the weakness Alec needed. He knew what Ames was thinking: that relenting on such a small issue was no big deal, that it was fine to agree it was morning when he was certain – for no rational reason, given the fact that he hadn't seen the sky for days – that it was actually night. He's telling himself that he can say whatever he wants as long as he doesn't give me any important information,_ Alec knew. _And he's doing it even though he knows in his heart of hearts that this concession is just the first, that giving in this first time will make it easier next time, and the time after that. He's breaking, and he no longer has the strength of will to care._ Alec just hoped he would get what he needed in time. The situation in Terminal City had just grown unexpectedly unstable, and Alec knew for the first time that he was on a rapidly dwindling time limit._

"Are you ready to give me what I want yet?" Alec asked, knowing the answer before he received it.

"Fuck you," Ames mumbled, almost incoherently. Alec had turned off the strobes and the speakers when he'd gone in, and he noted that in the mere seconds he'd been in the room, White had already just about fallen asleep.

"No, we don't want that," he muttered, walking over to the I.V. drip behind the chair. He took a syringe out of his pocket and injected LSD into the tube, knowing that would help to break down the Familiar even faster. A little hallucination never hurts,_ he decided. _It'll be that much harder to resist if he's not sure what's real and what isn't. I can't even begin to imagine the kinds of tricks his mind is about to play on him._ "Nighty-night," Alec commented with a grin as he walked away toward the door._

He'd better break pretty soon,_ Alec told himself as he turned the strobes and speakers back on. _He's taking his sweet time giving in, and I only have one more card to play. I'd hate to have to get **really** mean.

\-------------------------

Alec gathered himself to dart across the street, half-hoping that he wouldn't be able to make it to the restaurant entrance just a dozen yards away. He knew that Keri was watching the street from somewhere above him. Her instructions had been simple – take him out when he left from 304 Gates Blvd. Of course, this being a training exercise, 'take him out' meant shoot him with one of the ink gel rounds loaded in her rifle. They wouldn't kill, but they'd sting like hell – the gel capsules were set at the top of a live round, so they left the muzzle at close to the same velocity as an actual bullet. And while Alec hated the thought of getting hit, he knew that for Keri to demonstrate proficiency with her sniper rifle – and show Alec that he'd trained her well – he'd have to endure a little pain.

He'd given her no time frame, expecting her to settle in and take as long as was necessary. She'd learned patience, and she'd also proven herself to be a natural with the rifle. Her eye-hand coordination was superb, and she had a knack for locating environmental clues indicating wind direction and speed. Now she had only to show that she could maintain full concentration for an extended period of time and react within the blink of an eye. He'd kept her waiting half the day and well into the night; sunrise was only an hour away, and Alec had to decide whether to leave now and take advantage of the last remnants of darkness, or take advantage of a longer wait but make his move during the daylight.

_Or maybe I'll try something else entirely,_ he thought, another strategy popping into his mind unexpectedly. _It's not quite fair, but then many of the people we'll run up against won't be playing fair, either._

Alec reached into his bag and took out his nightvision binoculars, slowly scanning the rooftops across the street for the slightest sign of his would-be executioner. _This would probably have been a lot easier with some daylight,_ he decided, taking a few moments to wonder whether he should just wait until daybreak, when he could take full advantage of sunlight. _No, nighttime offers the best cover_

Alec had just about given up when he found something out of place. He couldn't see Keri, but he could see a shadow that looked just the slightest bit irregular. _Either she's right there, just out of view, or there's another light farther back on the roof, causing the restaurant's exhaust fan to cast its shadow differently than I'd expect._ He weighed the possibilities and decided to take a chance.

Within a few minutes Alec had donned his black sweatshirt to go along with his black cargo pants and made his way out the back door. He walked two blocks down, and then circled all the way around to Keri's back, scaling the wall of the building that she was using for cover. He quickly checked the lighting and noted that there weren't any additional lights; an equally quick scan of the rooftop revealed Keri's position. _Damn good hiding place,_ Alec noted with approval. An old chimney – sealed off before the Pulse when the restaurant below went from gourmet to short-order – had partially crumbled, and Keri had wedged herself underneath it, using the mound of rubble to obscure her shape and the long rifle in her hands.

Alec was a ghost, gliding soundlessly over the sagging rooftop until he was only ten feet away from his apprentice. He momentarily considered running up and saying, "Boo!" in her ear, but settled for a more professional coup. "Bang, you're dead," he said joylessly, disappointed in a victory that meant his student had lost.

The automatic response was a slicing pain that cut into the back of his right shoulder, causing him to drop his pistol. "Tsk, tsk, tsk," Keri chided from behind him. Alec whirled and settled his gaze on her – she looked like the cat that swallowed the canary.

"What the --"

"Silly rabbit," she said with a smirk. "Tricks are for strippers with sniper rifles."

_She set me up,_ he marveled silently. While he was amazed at her foresight and cunning, though, he was also irritated. "Nice trap, but what if I had just walked out the front door like I told you I would?"

"But you didn't do that, did you?" Keri shot back, amused despite her teacher's rebuke.

"But what if I did?"

"And what if night was day and up was down?"

"Huh?"

"If you just walked into the scope of a rifle you knew was waiting, then you wouldn't be Alec," she told him, suddenly sounding every bit the teacher rather than the apprentice. "You said that we'll get dossiers on our targets, that we have to study them and choose the best time and place for our hits, right?"

"Yeah, that's right," Alec confirmed, seeing exactly where Keri was going with her reasoning.

"So I know you, and I know your tendencies," she explained, saying just what he expected. "And you're not one to play the victim."

"I guess not," Alec admitted glumly.

"I would have been by the chimney if you'd been someone else; but you were you, so I set you up."

"And I walked right into it…" Alec muttered, trying to figure out if he was more proud of Keri, or humiliated at his own failure. _If Lydecker were alive to see this, he would have put a bullet in my kneecap – or my skull – for being so careless. And I would have deserved it…_

"So I passed, right?"

"Of course."

"So I get to go with you on your next job?"

"Yup."

"Cool beans."

\-------------------------

"Can you see me?" Alec asked into the sub-vocal microphone he was wearing in his ear.

"Stand by," Keri's voice came to him in reply. "That truck behind you is obstructing my view." A moment passed as the rented moving truck pulled away down the alley, and then she continued. "Yeah, I got ya."

"I'm planning on using this door as my exit, too," he told her needlessly. _We've been over this plan about a hundred times,_ he reminded himself. _You wouldn't have taken her on as an apprentice if you thought she'd need you to repeat basic stuff like that at the last minute._

"Understood."

"See you in a few," he added as he opened the door adjacent to the rear delivery dock and walked inside. His target had only been identified as Mr. Brett Hahneman, importer-exporter. Alec knew that all but certainly meant he was involved in smuggling and likely had ties to organized crime. The security inside the building had not backed up that theory, though. While Hahneman had several armed guards, there were no alarm systems, dogs, or cameras. The hit would actually be as simple as walking in, shooting the man, and walking back out.

A burly man in a sweat-stained Hawaiian shirt glared at Alec as soon as he walked in, and not to be deterred, Alec walked right up to him. "Hi, I'm Michael Collins from the Aegis Corporation," Alec said smoothly, producing with a flourish one of the business cards he'd printed up the night before. "I'm here about security cameras."

"We don't have security cameras," the burly man said, his breath stinking of the stale beer he'd drank the night before. "Get lost."

"I know you don't have security cameras," Alec responded, seemingly oblivious to the other man's attempt at an intimidating stare. "That's why I'm here. I was told that a Mr. Hahneman wanted to speak to a representative of my company, Mr. … umm…"

"Gregg," the guard replied. "I'm just Gregg, and I didn't hear anything about you."

"Oh, and are you Mr. Hahneman's secretary?" Alec asked, knowing his question would piss off the guard. "If you could let him know I'm here, Gregg, that would be great."

"Are you _trying_ to get him to hit you?" Keri asked over the com. Alec grinned.

"You think you're pretty funny, huh?" Gregg asked Alec, poking him in the chest with his forefinger.

"Not at all," Alec answered, trying to suppress a chuckle. "I was just reminded – for no particular reason, mind you – of an amusing anecdote a friend of mine was telling last evening."

"Huh?"

"An anecdote," Alec repeated. "A short story pertaining to one's personal life, often with a humorous twist. For example, there was this one time, in band camp…"

"Shut up and get out," the man growled.

"Am I to take it that you're _not_ going to announce me?"

"That's right."

"But I have an appointment."

"I know all of the boss's appointments, and you're not on the list," Gregg said threateningly. "Now I suggest you --" The last words were lost as the man gasped for breath through a shattered trachea.

"Took you long enough," Keri groused from her rooftop outside. "He was really starting to bug me."

"Cut the chatter," Alec warned her. He chalked her talkativeness up to expected nervousness, but also decided he should explain again how the com should be for emergencies only. He doubted there was anyone monitoring frequencies inside this low-grade target's warehouse, but in the future it might be a different story.

He walked farther into the building, silently strangling two guards as he went, until he reached Hahneman's office. He could hear someone – he guessed it was his target – talking on the phone. Alec waited for the conversation to end, and then knocked softly on the door as he opened it. "Hi, are you Mr. Hahneman?"

"Who wants to know?" Alec noted the man's hand slowly move below the desk, presumably toward a weapon of some kind. _At least he's smart enough to know I probably shouldn't have gotten this far without any of his guards alerting him._

"My name's Michael Collins, from the Aegis Corporation." He started to produce another business card, only to have Hahneman draw a .357 Magnum and point it at his head. "Oh shit," he said in the meekest, most deferential voice he could muster. "I'm just getting a card, sir. I'm not… I don't have a… Oh, shit."

"How the fuck did you get back here?" Hahneman asked suspiciously.

"I spoke to Gregg outside," Alec responded, still playing the part of a terrified weakling. "My boss arranged for this appointment. Gregg said it was okay to come back here."

"Oh, _Gregg_ said," Hahneman answered sarcastically. "I wonder if Gregg is aware that he's just a hired thug…" Hahneman looked his guest over coolly. "I'm sorry, Mr. Collins, but not only does Gregg not have the authority to schedule appointments for me, as of right now he's not even in my employ anymore."

_Actually, he stopped being in your employ about a minute and a half ago,_ Alec replied silently.

"I don't know how much your boss paid Gregg to get a meeting, but the money was wasted. Now if you'll please leave."

"Of course," Alec said as he took a few cautious steps back.

"I won't shoot you in the back," Hahneman said, seeming thrilled with the feeling that he had Alec thoroughly frightened. "Trust me."

He started to lower the weapon, and Alec struck. The transgenic's right arm was a blur as he drew his 10mm and fired a single round straight through the middle of Hahneman's forehead. He immediately heard approaching footsteps, and fired off the rest of his clip as quickly as he could, putting nine more rounds into the target's body. _Overkill,_ Alec remembered. _The employer wants overkill. No open casket for friends and family._ He was out the door just in time to run into a blaze of gunfire from two more guards. Alec dove for cover, and then was off and running toward the rear exit.

"Hope you're ready out there," he shouted, knowing that Keri was doubtlessly more than prepared. The only thing that remained to be seen was whether any qualms about killing would affect her aim.

Alec ran back the way he came, dashing out onto the loading dock. The two men followed, and Alec whirled and took aim. A thick red mist exploded where the head of the man on the right used to be, and Alec cut down the second one before Keri had a chance to make it two-for-two.

"Thanks," he said into the com. "See ya back home."

"Yeah, see ya," Keri said, a hint of uneasiness in her voice. _Yup, that was the first time she ever killed someone,_ Alec knew. He'd suspected that she had never taken a life, but he had never asked. He knew Keri had been curious about that oversight, but he'd always found the question rather useless. People often lied, for one reason or another, when asked whether they'd ever killed. _And now for Keri the matter is settled. No denials or false claims of bravado are necessary._


	5. Starting Down a New Path

            Keri rolled off of Alec, her sweaty body seeming to give off its own reddish-amber glow in the late-afternoon sunlight shining through the window.  Alec reached over to the nightstand and grabbed a cigarette, lighting it with a practiced flick of his lighter, and looked over to his spent protégé.  “That was…”  He struggled to find the right word, considering – and rejecting – astonishing, volcanic, and epic before deciding that the inability to find the appropriate word said far more than any adjective ever could.

            “Yeah,” Keri agreed, borrowing Alec’s cigarette and taking a long drag.

            “Not good for your lungs,” Alec chided as he took back the cigarette and enjoyed a long drag, himself.

            “But it feels good,” Keri responded with a playful grin.  “Makes me even more lightheaded than I already am.  Which is no small feat.”

            Alec only smiled in reply.  He’d been expecting a solemn, guilt-ridden young woman to walk through his door after the hit, and even then only after hours of introspection and self-therapy.  Instead he found a charged dynamo in a black silk teddy waiting for him.

            Keri had been insatiable in the hours since and was only now starting to settle back down to her usual, reserved state.  She was once more the quiet, unassuming girl who few would ever expect to have been a stripper, and none would guess was now a professional assassin.  _She’s gonna be amazing someday,_ Alec decided.  _As long as she doesn’t get careless, as long as she never gets to like it too much…  And as long as she keeps studying with me, of course._

            “I think I might be ready for some sleep now,” Keri muttered, rolling over just enough to pick her glass up from the floor next to the bed and drain the last swallow of her drink.

            “So soon?” Alec quipped.  She turned back to him and flashed him a thin, seductive grin.

            “Well I know you’re not ready to go again yet, anyway,” she teased as she got out of bed and headed back into the kitchen for another Beam and Coke.

            “Give a guy a chance,” Alec objected, taking the time to enjoy the view as the last rays of sunshine glistened off her pale skin and sparkled in her lavender eyes.

            “And maybe some viagra,” she called out once she’d reached the safety of the other room.  “You need a refill?” she asked, her voice accompanied by the singsong clinking of fresh ice cubes dropping into her glass.

           “Always.  But hold the Coke this time.”  Alec’s smile slowly died away as he steeled himself to talk business.  “You did well today,” he said evenly, trying not to sound too congratulatory.  He first wanted to see how she’d react to the reminder of their hit before he discussed it too much.  The tone of her voice back at the warehouse was still on his mind; he wasn’t going to rush her into dealing with it if she wasn’t ready.

            “You, too,” she replied, her grin vanishing.

Silence reigned for several minutes, Alec trying to decide what to say next.  Keri returned to the comfort of the bed, handed him the bourbon, and left him to continue the conversation.  He wondered at his inability to speak with someone he’d come to know so well.  _It’s not like me to be unable to talk business,_ he noted.  _This is definitely different, and not in a good way._  The silence was starting to grow painful, and every moment Alec let it drag on, the harder he found it to speak.

            “Look, I’m gonna be fine,” she assured him, finally relieving Alec of the burden of starting the necessary conversation.  “It’s sweet of you to be concerned, though.”

            “Huh?” Alec asked, hoping he didn’t look as surprised as he knew he sounded.  “It’s not about being sweet.  It’s about making sure you’re okay.  If you don’t want to go out there and do that ever again, that’s fine.  This isn’t for everyone.  And besides, if you’re not gonna be able to handle it, I need to know now… before we’re in the field and any hesitation might mean my life.  Or yours.”

            “I’ll be fine,” Keri told him again.  “I’ll admit that I was a little weirded out at first, but I got over it pretty quickly.  Right afterward I even felt a little sick, actually, but then I felt this… rush, or something.  I got sorta wound up, and…”

            “I noticed,” Alec replied, fondly remembering Keri mauling him before he’d even taken off his jacket.

            “Hope you didn’t mind too much,” she said, a flirtatious pout spreading across her lips.  “’Cause, you know, we don’t ever have to that again if you don’t want.”

            “No, I want,” Alec assured her.  “Oh boy do I want.”

            “So you say,” Keri cooed.  “But we’re about to find out just how badly,” she whispered in his ear, just before she rolled over and straddled him again.

 

\-------------------------

 

            623, 639, 653,_ Alec counted silently, checking each of the house numbers on the opposite side of Pugh Street.  _There it is – 679._  He watched for several minutes, trying to detect the slightest indication that there was anyone inside.  Minutes passed, and Alec once again checked the surrounding lighting, hoping he had enough cover behind the long-overgrown bushes outside an abandoned home – just one of many in the once-booming town of State College, Pennsylvania.  With the Pulse had come concerns having more to do with survival and less with higher education; when Penn State’s students left, the local economy collapsed._

            And of course this is where my target is,_ Alec thought, cursing his unfortunate luck.  _With no one around it’ll be next to impossible to approach the building undetected without getting at least a little luck on my side.  _Minutes stretched into hours, and Alec glanced at his watch.  03:50.  _Not too long before the eastern horizon’s gonna start getting a little gray,_ he warned himself.  _If this is gonna happen under cover of darkness, it’ll have to be soon.

_            “Fuck it,” Alec grumbled, dashing out from behind the bushes and darting across the cracked, uneven asphalt that had once been a smoothly paved road.  He reached his destination – another group of overgrown bushes – and paused slightly, sensing no indication that he had been detected.  _So either no one’s seen me, or I just haven’t figured out that they have,_ he decided.  _Here’s hoping for Option #1.

_            He moved again, stunned that he was able to make it to the doorway of 679 Pugh Street without coming under fire or setting off an alarm.  He’d found two trip-wires and could only guess at their purposes, since he didn’t stop to check them out; but Alec still couldn’t shake the feeling that it was all too easy.  _I can’t imagine it would be as simple for anyone else if they came for me.

            _He set up the primer cord in seconds, a practiced, transgenically engineered hand taking a fraction of the time that could be managed by the most accomplished human demolitions specialists in the world.  He braced himself at the side of the doorframe and pressed the detonator.  The shaped charge blew the door inward, simultaneously giving Alec both an entrance and a cloud of debris that served as a modicum of cover.  He entered warily but quickly, hoping to find his target in the first few seconds, before a proper defense could be mounted.  For the first time in his life, Alec found his lucky streak continuing unexpectedly._

_            A dark form dashed into the room at the edge of Alec’s peripheral vision.  What would have been an easy coups de grace against an ordinary turned into a huge tactical error when faced with a transgenic’s heightened reflexes – Alec’s target never really had a chance.  Alec dove for the floor, hearing his opponent slice through the unexpectedly vacant air where Alec’s head had been only a fraction of a second earlier.  _Him and that sword of his,_ Alec cursed silently.  _Only one from his group would be stupid enough to being a sword to a gunfight._  Alec rolled forward, bouncing to his feet and leveling his weapon with cold indifference.  No words accompanied his victory; there was simply one round, fired directly into the center of his target’s chest._  Hope that doesn’t end up killing him,_ Alec thought absently, trying to force any sentiment from his mind.  _Woulda preferred a tranq, but that’s out of the question.  It’s not what our enemies would have used.  They would be out to kill, no questions asked, and I can’t risk raising questions by being merciful.

_            With the one defender out of the way, Alec proceeded down a hallway, opening every door he found.  The third one he tried led to a stairway that descended into a basement.  _That’s where I’d put him,_ he decided, proceeding cautiously into the darkness, searching for a light switch that might relieve him of the burden of counting on his nightvision.  He found one, but predictably enough no light burst to life at the flip of the switch.  _Probably hasn’t been power in this damn building for at least a decade,_ he decided._

_            A moment later he discovered he didn’t need any lights.  He found a huddled form lying at the back of the basement, its head covered in a hood.  “Who’s there?” a young voice called out._

He can smell me,_ Alec realized.  _Even through the hood.  Or maybe he can tell that I walk differently… Either way, he knows I’m not the same one who’s been holding him hostage._  “It’s okay,” he replied reassuringly.  “I’ve come to get you out of here.”  Alec removed the hood, looking into the small eyes with the most compassionate expression he could muster._

_            “Who are you?”_

_            “Not now,” Alec answered, suddenly remembering that his most compassionate expression was less than worthless – he was still wearing his ski mask.  “Let’s get out of here first.  Let me see your wrists,” he muttered, gesturing to the shackles that held the boy to the wall.  As soon as the child’s attention was diverted, Alec drove a syringe into his arm, injecting enough anesthetic to keep him asleep until they reached the Mississippi._

_            “What?” the child cried out, realizing he had been deceived._

_            “Quiet, Ray,” Alec said soothingly.  “I’m taking you back out West.  I need your help with something.”  _There’s no telling what’ll happen once my plan gets going_, Alec reminded himself.  _Any one of a bazillion things could still go wrong, and I’m not going to the table without an ace up my sleeve.

 

\-------------------------

 

            Alec grabbed his mug as he rose from the new couch and walked into the kitchen, deciding to retrieve the hidden bottle of Jameson whiskey he kept in a cabinet above the refrigerator, safely away from Keri’s curious eyes.  _Time to make my morning coffee a little Irish._  He doubted Keri would have approved had she been there, but she was out getting groceries at a new market that had opened a few weeks earlier.  _“They actually have a steady stock of items,” _he remembered Keri telling him wistfully the first time she had asked for money to go shopping for them._  “This is the first full-service supermarket in the area in, like, twenty years.  Trust me, you’ll be happy I went.”  _Alec had trusted her, and Keri had been proven right.  _One stop shopping,_ Alec marveled, wondering briefly why anyone would trust the same store to carry everything they might want.  It seemed almost unnatural not to have to go to an outdoor market consisting of a myriad of specialty shops.  _What’ll they think of next?  And how much will it cost me when Keri decides it’s too good to pass up?_

            “Don’t even go there,” he muttered threateningly to his subconscious, which was once again addressing a concern he’d rather ignore until some other time.  _Like when?_ he asked himself, wondering if, in fact, he actually had a separate personality living deep inside his mind, the product of some kind of long-forgotten Manticore torture that had caused him to dissociate to the extent that his personality was fractured.  Too often he found himself playing devil’s advocate, speaking to himself as if there actually were two people in the conversation.  He wondered if other, “normal” people did the same thing.  _And if they don’t is this something Ben did?_

            That disturbing thought was easily pushed away.  Unlike other memories, there was absolutely no part of him that _ever_ wished to dwell upon the possibility that he had any form of slowly developing psychosis.  _Unlike other memories,_ that all too familiar voice in his head teased.  _Like the memories of the only other women you got close to, perhaps?_

            “Son of a bitch,” Alec growled.  “Fine, I like Keri,” he mumbled, making an admission that did little but scare him.  “But this is different.  It won’t be like last time.”  _Or the time before that? _he asked himself.  “Fuck.”

            _The time before that,_ he thought, his mind racing along memory lane to its destination – a place Alec’s thoughts had not visited for a long, long time.  _Rachel,_ he remembered with a heavy combination of pain, guilt, and rage.  He hadn’t really thought about her since a couple of months after her death; he’d done his damnedest to repress every memory of the first woman he’d ever loved, deciding that forgetting her – and all the good things he’d enjoyed with her – was far easier and preferable to deciding whether he was angrier with his Manticore superiors for giving the order that led to her death, or himself for giving in so easily.  _It would be so easy to change,_ he decided.  _If I could go back in time, the solution would be so simple.  If I only knew then what I know now…_

            Alec found himself inspired to make his morning coffee pretty much exclusively Irish and not at all coffee_._  _Not that drinking away the sorrow and guilt will solve anything,_ he noted silently, surprising himself with the straightforward manner in which he admitted the reality of his problems.  It had been years since he forced himself to face certain truths, most importantly the ones that dealt with consequences and the need to own up to them.

            _Fine, _he told himself.  _I’ve made mistakes, and things ended badly for the only two women I ever cared about.  I made mistakes because of inexperience, because of bad judgment.  And even because of a lack of follow-through,_ he admitted, wincing as the words “half-done” burst forth from the deepest closet in his mind.  _That doesn’t mean I’m bound to make mistakes again.  I’ll be careful this time.  I’ll take care of Keri.  I’ll make sure I’m worthy of the affection she gives me.  I’ll be the guy she thinks I can be.  I owe her that much._

            Alec grinned at his unexpected ability to address his guilt about past mistakes and fears about future ones.  _I can be happy again.  And I’ll prove it as soon as Keri gets back._

 

\-------------------------

 

            “You awake?” Alec asked softly, half-hoping that Keri would be sound asleep.

            “Yeah,” she answered groggily.  “What’s up?”  Keri turned over onto her side to face Alec, having no idea how clearly his enhanced eyes could see her in the near-darkness.

            “Tomorrow is June 15th,” Alec muttered.

            “Uh-huh.”

            “And I get my assignments on the 15th,” Alec told her needlessly.  Keri knew all of this already, and Alec sensed that she knew he was stalling, trying to avoid what was really bothering him.  She remained silent, waiting for him to get to the point.  _Or maybe she just fell asleep._  “I’m not sure I want you going with me on my next job.”

            “What?!”  If she hadn’t already been fully awake, she certainly was now.  “That’s bullshit, Alec.  You let me go last month, and I’ve only gotten better since then.  I haven’t done anything wrong… I don’t deserve this.”

            “It’s not like I’m punishing you,” he responded, pleading for understanding and forgiveness.  “I just don’t think I want to put you out there again.  Not like that.”

            “It’s not your decision to make.”

            “Actually, it is… and you’re too important to me to put you in danger,” Alec yelled, surprised at the forcefulness in his voice.  He noticed that it almost completely concealed the fear, the anxiety over her welfare.

            “Too important?” Keri answered incredulously.  She sat up and scowled down at him.  “What the fuck are you doing?”

            “I don’t want to lose you.”  The words were barely audible, Alec afraid to allow himself to hear them, no less bare his soul to Keri.  But she heard him.

            “What makes you think you’ll lose me?” she asked, in a heartbeat her self-righteous rage gone, replaced by tender compassion.

            “Because it always happens that way,” he answered, knowing how absurd he sounded.

            “Huh?”

            “It’s not important.”  He began to roll over, only to have Keri grab his shoulder in a vice-like grasp, forcing him to look at her.

            “What do you mean?”  He wanted to stay silent, but she was insistent.  “Tell me, Alec.  Tell me right now or I’m walking out the door.”

            “Do you trust me?” he asked, wondering even as he spoke why that question had been so important.  It wasn’t something he had meant to say.

            “Without reservation,” she assured him

            “I love you,” Alec admitted, his voice sounding frightened and empty, belying the warmth of his words.  “And every time I love someone…”  His voice trailed off as he searched for the best way to put it.  “It ends badly,” he told her.

            “I’m sorry.”

            “And it’s always my fault.”  Keri continued to look at him, almost as if she expected him to continue.  He didn’t.

“Okay,” she finally said with a faint nod of the head.  “I know it must be painful, Alec, but you can’t blame yourself for everything.”  Alec could tell she was choosing her words carefully, not wanting to make a big deal of his confession until she knew exactly what the circumstances had been but still being unwilling to dismiss his claims as exaggerated.

            “You’ll have to trust me when I tell you that it’s perfectly reasonable to blame myself for this,” he told her.  “I’m a very dangerous person to be around, in more ways than you can imagine.”

            “I pretty much expected that, hon,” she replied with a grin.  “Given what you do for a living, I expect a little bit of danger.”

            “Not because of what I do,” he said evenly.  “Because of what I am.”  He hadn’t expected to get into this with her, but he realized that he had gone too far, that his subconscious was demanding honesty with the woman to whom he’d let himself grow too close.

            “You’re an assassin,” she said with certainty and understanding.

            “No, that’s what I do,” he said, slowly shifting his weight so he could reach behind him and turn on the light on the nightstand.  Then he rolled back over, his face into the pillow, and pointed to the back of his neck.  “Take a look,” he directed.  “It’s been a few days since I took the laser to it.  You should be able to see it, faintly.”

            Keri looked closely, and he felt her fingertips brush against his skin right where he knew his barcode was reappearing.  “Holy shit,” she gasped.  “You’re a . . . you’re…”

            “A freak,” he finished for her, rolling back over to lock his eyes on hers.

            “That’s why you didn’t want me saying that word,” she commented with a smile of sudden understanding.  “No, Alec, you’re not a freak.”

            “Oh really?”  Despite the look in her eyes, despite his desire to believe her, Alec’s gaze shifted to Keri’s hands, wary for the slightest movement that would indicate she was reaching for a weapon.  The only move she made was toward him, grasping him in a tight hug.

            “I’m strangely fine with it,” she explained.  “Seems weird to me, actually.  Maybe ’cause it’s not something I ever thought about happening to me.  I thought the transgenics were extinct.”

            “Not quite yet,” Alec admitted.  “There are still a handful of us.  We don’t pass on our traits to offspring if we mate with ordinaries, though… except for once, anyway… and there aren’t enough of us to create a stable gene pool.  Within fifty years we’ll be well and truly gone.”  He felt uncomfortable explaining the plight of his people so casually, just moments after he was on guard against Keri attacking him for being a transgenic.  The whole situation was starting to become rather surreal.

            “Out of curiosity,” she suddenly asked, “does this mean that those other ones – the Familiars – are they still alive?”

            “Probably,” Alec answered, giving voice to the fear he’d always secretly held.  “Been years since I've seen one, but there were more of them than there were of us, and they could hide far more easily.  I’m sure there are still some left… though I hope they’re as badly off as my kind are.”  Memories of the global war fought between the transgenics and the Familiars came back to him – cities reduced to ash, governments toppled when they took one side or the other, entire civilizations destroyed as the Familiars played nations against each other in order to create cover from their enemies.  Five bloody years that ended with the worldwide assumption that the two sides had fought to their mutual extinction.  Alec had always assumed that most world leaders knew better – that mutual extinction would have been well nigh impossible to achieve.  No one could be that lucky; but no one in his right mind was in a rush to suggest that one or two super-species might still be in existence, each possibly planning its next attempt at worldwide domination.  The overwhelming majority of the ordinaries weren’t ready to deal with that possibility, so deliberate ignorance provided bliss.

            “So what exactly does this all have to do with me?”

            “It’s like this,” Alec tried to explain.  “The normal person, from what I can tell, lives a rather uninteresting life.  He wakes up, goes to work, comes home, has dinner, then goes to sleep.  Most days are just like that, with the only variety being the tasks that are assigned during the workday, or the different shows he may watch on TV while unwinding after he finally gets home.  Not very riveting.  My life has always been different.  I have a life with enough action, excitement, and variety to be the basis for some over-priced TV series of its own.”

            “Oh, aren’t you getting self-important right now,” Keri teased.  “Hate to break the news, but I can’t imagine anyone getting more than one season out of you… well, one good season, anyway, transgenic or not.”

            “I’m serious,” Alec retorted in frustration.  “Don’t you see what I’m saying?  Things happen to me that don’t happen to normal people, Keri.  I go out and kill people for a living.  People shoot at me.  People try to blow me up.  That’s usually no biggie for me, because I’m a transgenic.  I can pretty much squeak by no matter what happens.  But you’re an ordinary, and ordinaries tend to get killed when very bad people come looking for me.”

            “I can take care of myself,” Keri assured him.  “Don’t think you’re shutting me out of your life.”

            “I’m trying to do the exact opposite,” Alec explained.  “I’m trying to keep you in my life.  I’m trying to keep you safe, and that means keeping you away from the things I do.  For instance, what if a Familiar settled in Seattle and tracked me down?  Don’t think for a second that you’d stand a snowball’s chance in hell if that Familiar set his sights on you.”

            “But that could happen whether I’m working with you or not,” Keri pointed out.  “At least if I’m working with you I’ll be learning to take care of myself; I’ll be keeping a sharp edge.  I won’t be the vulnerable little thing I was before you started training me.”

            There was little Alec could say to that; he hadn’t thought about it that way before.  _What if she’s right?_ he wondered.  _What if just being around me at all is dangerous, whether I take her into the field or not?  This whole thing may have been a terrible mistake._  “Let’s just talk about it in the morning,” he replied, hoping to draw a compromise – and some time to think.  “I’ll take a look at whatever jobs they have for me this month, and we’ll discuss whether you have any skills yet that could be useful.  If you do, fine.  If not, you’ll just have to accept being left out of the loop.”

            “Fine,” Keri said reluctantly.  “We’ll talk in the morning.”

 

 


	6. Reopening Old Wounds

After more than twelve hours of walking aimlessly through Seattle, Alec realized that, just like an abandoned cat, he’d once again found his way back home. He considered turning away just as he had the last time. And the time before that. The fact that he hadn’t gotten any assignments the previous morning – while unprecedented and financially unfortunate – had allowed him an extra day to decide what he was going to do about his dilemma. _This is crazy,_ he told himself, wondering what the hell he was thinking. What Keri had told him was true – he couldn’t afford to keep her in his life at all if he was concerned about her safety. He had resolved just to slip out and disappear the next time she went shopping when a new thought occurred to him – he would inevitably go somewhere else and put himself in the same situation all over again. Sure, he might succeed in keeping any and all interpersonal interactions safely at arm’s length, thus avoiding romantic entanglements, but he would end up relying on his somewhat limited skill set to provide income while also maintaining a low profile. _The life isn’t just unsafe for Keri – it’s also unsafe for me._ He had been unable to avoid the obvious conclusion that he had deliberately put himself in such a risky position because he wanted the danger. There was simply no other explanation.

He then began to wonder _why_ he wanted to put himself in that situation. _Why would someone put himself in a position that would inevitably get him killed sooner than he’d like?_ The only answer he could produce was that on some level, it _wasn’t_ sooner than he’d like. He took a step back and examined everything in his life, from his career, to his drinking, to the seedy neighborhood he’d chosen as his home. He was daring the world to kill him, and the whole time secretly hoping the world would succeed. It was an uncomfortable epiphany.

_But why would I want to die?_ he’d asked himself. _Especially now, when I’m so happy?_ That was the question that had brought enlightenment. He remembered his early days at Manticore, when Lydecker had them run an experiment. They’d placed a frog in a shallow pan of water, the edge of both the pan and the water level low enough to allow the frog to jump out at any time. They then raised the temperature of the pan extremely slowly – one degree every half hour. The frog adapted to the increase, never realizing that its environment was getting dangerous. In the end, all of the frogs died – cooked in the water – because they had grown so used to adapting to the gradual, almost imperceptible changes that they overlooked taking the comparatively drastic step of just hopping out of the water. Alec realized that he was the frog.

_I didn’t put myself into this position because I’ve been subconsciously looking for a way to get myself killed,_ he realized. _I put myself in this position because I’ve spent years adapting to the immediate situation without ever looking at the wider picture. _ Ever since leaving Manticore, he had made slight changes, one after the other, each of them allowing him to adapt to the current dangers even as he became more threatened by his surroundings. It was inevitable that at some point he would reach the threshold where he realized further changes were impossible, that he had run out of options and there was no escape. _I’m jumping out of the pan of water,_ he told himself. _I’m giving up my job – it’s not like I need more money, anyway – and I’m leaving Seattle. I’ll move east, maybe to Vermont or Maine. Somewhere with lots of clean air, wide-open spaces, and very, very few people. And I’m taking Keri with me._ He couldn’t help but grin. _I can’t believe I’m doing this…_

A tingle ran up Alec’s spine as he entered his building, replacing his giddy, adolescent joy of life with wary anxiety. Something was wrong – he knew it in his gut the way a field mouse feels the shadow of a watching owl. It was instinctual, and years of experience had taught him to listen to his instincts at all times. He’d learned that lesson the hard way.

The stairs creaked softly under his feet, just as they always did; the light on the second floor landing flickered in the same way; a cool, summer night’s breeze still wafted in through the space between the boards covering the shattered window at the end of the second-floor hallway. So many things seemed the same that, at first, Alec had trouble identifying anything noticeably wrong. As much as he trusted his instincts, there was still an overly rational part of his mind that demanded objective evidence to support his hunches.

_It’s quiet,_ he warned himself. _Too quiet._ He checked his watch – 2330 hours. By this time of the night the Robertsons were usually going at it like cats and dogs. Bill would be home late again, and Sally would be convinced (rightly, Alec knew) that her drunken husband was carrying on an affair. But there wasn’t so much as a muttered complaint coming from apartment 203. _And it’s a Thursday night. Those goddamn college students in 307 should be raising a hell of a racket. But they’re not…_

Alec’s breathing shallowed out as he climbed the staircase to the third floor, realizing that he couldn’t hear a single conversation coming from any of his neighbors. Sidling up against the wall, he crept down the hallway toward the last door on the left – his apartment. He was still a dozen feet away when he realized the door was open a crack, though there weren’t any lights on.

_That enough objective evidence?_ he asked the logical side of his mind as he pulled a Sig-Sauer 10mm from the holster at the small of his back. He moved painfully slowly, managing to avoid making the slightest noise as he sneaked over the rickety, timeworn wooden floors. He crouched low as he reached his door, and softly pushed it in on its hinges.

“Oh my God,” he muttered. “Keri.”

\-------------------------

_“Max, you really shouldn’t leave your door open like that,” Alec called out, pushing the slightly ajar door fully open. He wasn’t even aware of the gasp that escaped his lips as he took in the carnage before him._

_His sense of smell was assaulted by the pungent, coppery scent of fresh blood, though he didn’t need his nose to tell him what his eyes could fully see. Shortly before the escape from Manticore, Alec overheard one of the other X5s reporting on the results of a strike, describing the scene as a slaughterhouse. Alec remembered thinking the description awkward hyperbole, trying to play up his success for Lydecker. He’d never believed – or been able to imagine – how a hit on a single individual could make a home look like a slaughterhouse. Now he knew._

_Blood literally drenched the living room, and Alec could only guess at how so much space could have been doused by the blood from only one individual. Splatter covered the walls, with grey tissue adhered – as if by glue – to one particularly large, bright scarlet stain on the window frame._

_Max’s scent permeated the metallic odor of the blood, clouding Alec’s reason and bringing tears to his eyes, obscuring his vision. He staggered through the apartment, trying to find her, hoping that despite all evidence to the contrary she would be okay, maybe hiding in a closet after fighting off her attackers. The truth slammed home as soon as he entered the bedroom. Her body was laid out on the bed, stripped and eviscerated. Her hands were resting on her throat, sickeningly peacefully now, though Alec could only assume that their position indicated that Max had died trying to free herself from the section of intestine that was used to strangle the final breaths from her body._

_Max’s mouth remained open in a silent death wail, but her eyes, gouged out and filled with viscous pools of blood, were hideously vacant. Alec had no idea how long he stood there staring, but he was aware that at some point his eyes began to drift over the rest of his friend’s corpse, and he noticed that her left index finger was missing. _Just like… _he realized, knowing that this scene was his fault. _How could I have been so careless? How could I have left the job only half-done, _knowing_ that something like this could happen?

_Alec had no memory of what he did next. He was vaguely aware that he screamed, but he had no idea how loudly or for how long. The next thing he knew, it was three days later when he woke up on the deck of a tugboat tied up at the docks – three days after their war against the Familiars was over; three days after Max was killed in the very first moment she was away from her guards. Only one thought existed in his mind – one obsessive desire that blocked out everything else._

\-------------------------

“Vengeance,” Alec muttered, his voice so consumed with fury that it sounded hollow. He turned his eyes away from the all-too-familiar bloodbath and focused his thoughts and his rage inward. “Whoever did this is a dead man.” _And it’ll take a long, long time for it to happen. There are no words to describe the suffering that I’m going to inflict._


	7. A Stroll Down Memory Lane

_            Alec gazed vacantly out the cracked windshield of his beaten-up Mustang, once again indulging in a moment of doubt.  _There’s gotta be another way,_ he argued silently, trying to figure another method of self-support.  _If Max were alive, she’d beat the living…

            _“Stop it,” he growled at himself, cutting off that avenue of thought.  “Max is dead, along with most everyone else.  The handful of us that are left are done, we’re splitting up.  There’s clearly only one thing I’m good at, and I need money.”_

But not like this,_ his conscience pleaded in a voice eerily reminiscent of a certain X5 he still loved.  Alec allowed himself a few moments to consider other alternatives, from being a busboy at some restaurant, to being a concert pianist, to living out his dream as the shortstop for the Seattle Mariners._

_            “Most anything that would get me the kind of money I want will bring with it the scrutiny of living in the public eye,” he reminded himself.  “And the stuff that would allow me to remain safely anonymous won’t let me live the lifestyle I want.”_

So this is about money?  _Alec wanted to deny his conscience’s question, but the simple act of glancing at his car’s fuel gauge forced him to admit the truth._

_            “I don’t even have enough cash to keep my car running,” he muttered miserably.  “I could be an All-Star athlete in any professional sport, I could be a virtuoso with pretty much any musical instrument in the world, I could even do something as simple as sell my story to a publisher.  But all of that would bring attention, and attention would get me killed.  This is bullshit.  I need money.  Now.”_

_            He opened the door and climbed out, taking the briefest moment to survey his surroundings, searching for threats as he went over his plan one last time.  He’d taken his time setting up this meeting, knowing that the slightest misstep could lead to the uncomfortable situation of having Russian hitmen shooting at him.  That was not the way he preferred to start his day._

            Not to mention it’d be a shame to waste a month and a half of planning,_ he reminded himself.  When the dust finally settled after the end of their war, its bloody aftermath, and the month-long bender Alec had undertaken to drown the pain, he’d come to the shocking realization that he needed a job.  After a weekend of thought and more drinking, he’d decided that the best starting point was to find a crooked politician.  There were plenty of them about, so that first step in employment turned out to be the easiest.  His target was one Washington State Congressman Jonathan K. Reece, Republican, married father of two children – Jonathan Junior, 11, and Kathryn, 7.  Reece had amassed enough cash from bribes, kickbacks, and the three embezzlement schemes Alec uncovered (though he suspected two others) that the Congressman literally had enough money to single-handedly fund Seattle for a full month._

_            Given the vast magnitude of Reece’s graft, Alec found it easy to enact his plan.  He first posed as a local college student so he could get a position as an intern on Reece’s staff.  Alec wanted to take his time in this phase of his scheme, but the fact that it was an unpaid position forced him to advance his timetable.  After only three weeks he asked his bookie, Sasha Primokov, to pass a message up the chain to Sergei Ivanov, the de facto head of the Russian mob in Seattle.  Alec kept his request suitably vague and was told a week later to show up here and now._

And now it’s show time._  He walked slowly, keeping his hands visible at all times, knowing that he was likely in the crosshairs of at least one sentry, probably two.  He wasn’t surprised by anything that followed – he reached the side door of Sergei’s waterfront warehouse, was frisked by a guard, walked in, was frisked again, and then was led up to the second floor, where Sergei apparently had an office.  Inside sat Sergei Ivanov, a man who’d always reminded Alec of John Malkovich in _Rounders_.  He’d seen him many times, but this was the first time he had a chance to speak to him.  _And if this is gonna work, I’d better remember to be on my best behavior.

            _“I hear you have some information for me,” Sergei said in a flat, uninterested tone that indicated his doubts that Alec had anything to say that would get him much money.  Alec noted that the Russian also lacked the thick accent most of his thugs had; he could only assume that Sergei had come to the States as a child._

_            “Yeah.”_

_            “And?” the Russian prompted, waving his hand impatiently._

_            “And I’d like to cover the topic of compensation before I say anything,” Alec replied, doing his best to keep his voice devoid of the arrogance Max always accused him of when he was in these types of situations.  Sergei only had two guards in the room – one on Alec’s right, just out of arm’s reach, and one on the opposite side of the room, standing next to the largest safe Alec had ever seen outside of a bank – so the Russian was more than vulnerable to his transgenic guest, despite the fact that Alec was unarmed.   Ivanov seemed confident, though, and that ill-advised overconfidence made part of Alec want to break a leg or two just on principle.  But he maintained his composure._

_            “Compensation…” Sergei repeated.  “You afraid you won’t be paid?”_

_            “I have no doubt that you’d be willing to pay me what you think the information is worth, but money isn’t what I’m after,” Alec answered._

_            “Oh really?” Sergei asked, either unable or unwilling to hide the fact that he was intrigued.  “So what is it you want?”_

_            “I want a reference,” Alec responded without hesitation.  “Someone you’ve done a lot of business with has been talking to the Feds, and this individual is getting a Get Out of Jail Free card for giving you up.  I’m offering to take care of the problem for you in exchange for a reference,” Alec explained.  “I’m new to the area, and I’m looking to break into the field of problem-solving.  It’s a tough market to crack when you don’t know anyone important.”_

_            “I have no idea what you mean – ‘problem-solving,’ ” the Russian replied with a smile, obviously playing to the audience he seemed to suspect was listening in on the conversation.  “I have no idea what you mean – ‘take care of the problem for me.’ ”  Alec couldn’t blame him for his wariness – he’d expected the problem, but there was really no way around it.  He wasn't likely to get the gangster to believe he wasn't wearing a wire, so he would just have to speak plainly._

_            “I understand your suspicion, so I’ll make it easy for you,” Alec offered.  “A certain individual is gonna talk.  I am willing to murder this person for you, thus allowing you to keep your hands clean.  I’m not interested in payment, either, for the information or my services.  All I would like is your agreement to connect me with someone who might be looking for a new employee with my skills.  That’s it, and that’s all.”_

_            Sergei’s smile broadened.  “Who is this individual?”_

_            “Do we have a deal?”_

_            “You got balls, coming in here making demands of me,” Sergei sighed._

_            “I’m not demanding anything,” Alec responded with a shrug.  “I’m only offering an item of information for sale and suggesting a method of valuation for said information.”_

_            “Balls of steel,” Sergei chuckled.  “I like you.”  He leaned back, forcing Alec to wonder how Sergei’s chair didn’t tip backward.  “Is deal.  But three conditions.  First, you have to tell me who the individual is, of course.  Second, you have to do the job publicly, so there’s less chance of police involvement in some sort of staged death.  As part of that, I also expect an opportunity to see the body, so no blowing this person up and leaving no identifiable body parts.  My cousin had the cops pull that fake assassination shit on him in Moscow.  Third, you have to take care of a second problem, as well.  You know, as a demonstration of good faith on your part.”_

_            “Fine,” Alec agreed, also having expected that possibility.  Sergei was famously paranoid about police entrapment, which was the primary reason he was still a free man.  He knew the police might send in an undercover officer to make the deal and set up a hit that could somehow be faked, but that officer would never actually be authorized to go through with a second hit just to make his ruse that much more convincing._

_            “Good,” Sergei replied with a thunderous clap of his hands.  “Is settled, then.”  Alec suddenly noticed that Sergei’s accent was curiously becoming thicker with every passing moment.  _Almost like he’s stepping into some kind of internalized Russian mobster role as he prepares to do business.  Weird.

_            “There’s one of my guards who’s been looking at my girlfriend, Natalie, in a way that I find less than professional,” Sergei explained.  “I want this guard killed.”_

_            “Tell me who, and I’ll take care of it.”  Sergei opened the drawer in front of him and pulled out a .38 caliber revolver.  He tossed it to Alec and pointed to the man standing to the transgenic’s right._

_            “Is him,” Sergei said.  In one fluid motion, Alec leveled the pistol and pulled the trigger, only to find the chamber empty.  The guard’s eyes had gone wide, and he took a step back, not seeming to realize that Sergei had given Alec an unloaded weapon._

_            “Needed to make sure you weren’t gonna just shoot me as soon as I gave you a pistol,” Sergei said apologetically.  He produced a second .38 and, like the previous one, tossed it to Alec.  “That one is loaded,” Sergei said unnecessarily; the weight of the weapon had immediately let Alec know the second revolver’s chamber held at least one round, maybe two._

_            The guard didn’t even have enough time to draw in a breath before Alec put a bullet through his left eye, showering a mist of blood, skull fragments, and brain matter on the wall behind him._

_            “You a quick-draw, like Billy the Kid or something,” Sergei commented with a smile, completely indifferent to the fact that half the head of one of his guards was now sprayed across the corner of his office._

_            Alec wiped down both pistols and indulged in a smile of his own.  “No, I’m _way_ faster than Billy the Kid,” he bragged, knowing he would only ingratiate himself more with such a claim._

_            “So who’s the son of a bitch talking to the Feds?”_

_            “Congressman Reece,” Alec answered as he placed the .38’s on the desk in front of the Russian gangster.  “I’m an intern at his office downtown, and I’ve seen the Feds around late at night.  Heard them talking, and Reece is giving up everything.  Mentioned you when he was talking about an off-shore super-tanker pier or something.”_

_            “You do it tonight?” Sergei asked, suddenly anxious.  Alec heard the gangster’s heart rate increase and his breaths become shorter and more frequent.  He’d definitely chosen the right project to mention._

_            “He’s probably gone home by now,” Alec answered.  “Can’t make it public for you that way.”_

_            “Doesn’t matter, I guess.  Take him out tonight.  The family, too.”_

_            “I’m not killing the family,” Alec retorted firmly, his tone brooking no argument on the matter.  “The deal was for Reece, not the family.”_

_            “It make you feel bad, killing a woman and kids?”_

_            “It makes me feel unprofessional,” Alec countered, sidestepping a question he only could have answered in the affirmative.  “Reece went looking for this when he started talking.  The family, as far as I know, hasn’t done anything.  I don’t have anything against killing women and children if it serves a purpose, but this would be sloppy.”_

_            “This would serve a purpose,” Sergei objected coolly, calculatedly.  He’d obviously had this conversation before.  Alec knew the ganster was about to start his spiel about how it would frighten the next dozen guys who thought they could flip on him, so the transgenic decided to beat him to the punch._

_            “I suppose,” Alec admitted.  “It would send the message that doing business with you meant not only getting killed, but also getting your family taken out.  It would send the message that anyone who worked with the Feds should pull his family off the street and go into protective custody immediately, thus depriving you of your chance to deal with the situation.”  Alec could see that Sergei wasn’t used to having his orders defied, but he thought a little logic would do him some good.  _As long as a little logic doesn’t get me shot.  I’m so not in the mood…

_            “Fine,” Sergei relented.  “Kill the Congressman, leave the family alive.  Or kill them, if you prefer.  I don’t care.  Come back tomorrow and I’ll introduce you to the Old Man.”_

_            “The old man?”_

_            “He runs a business north of the city,” Sergei explained.  “A… how you say… clearinghouse for your line of work.  Pay a visit to the Congressman tonight, and I’ll get you a job tomorrow.”_

 

\-------------------------

 

            “Hey,” Alec muttered weakly to the gravestone at his feet.  It read simply, ‘Max Guevarra.’  No date of birth or death, no inspirational epitaph, no reference to loved ones.  _She would have wanted it that way, I guess,_ Alec decided.  _By the time she died, most of her friends were already gone.  Joshua, Original Cindy, Sketchy, Zack…  Nope, if we buried her someplace public, the only ones who would have come are twisted bastards who would’ve dug her up for the sole purpose of defiling her corpse.  Just a simple stone that has enough markings for the last of us to be able to find her, to ask her for guidance.  Or forgiveness.  That’s all she’d ever want.  No medals, no memorials.  Just peace…_

            “I need to do something,” Alec said, his eyes directed away from Max’s grave and toward the bright green leaves of a nearby oak; five years after her death, and he was still unnerved by the thought of meeting her reproachful stare.  “I know I promised never to kill like this,” he admitted.  “I know I promised I would limit myself to work, never to make it personal.  And I even know you would have kicked my ass for doing that much, for what I do for a living,” he added.

            “And maybe you’d have been right, too.  I don’t know, Max, it’s not like I have any other marketable skills; it’s not like I have the luxury of doing anything that might attract too much attention.  I am what I am, and I’ve accepted that.  I was very careful to make sure I never got to like it, though,” he assured the cold, uninterested gravestone.  “You told me that’s what you thought happened with Ben… that somewhere along the way he discovered he liked being superior, that he liked the feeling killing ordinaries gave him, that he used his Blue Lady as an excuse to do what he secretly wanted to do all along.  No, Max… I’ve kept a healthy sense of self-loathing that would make you proud.  But not anymore, at least not for awhile.”

            Alec shrugged helplessly, trying not to think about the absurdity of speaking to a corpse, hoping for a feeling of forgiveness or approval from the one person who had never given him either when she felt he didn’t deserve it, who had always been honest, whether he liked it or not.  _She was more than a friend to me – so much more – even though she never let me be more than a friend to her._

            “I need to let go of the reins for awhile,” he explained.  “You probably know all about what happened to Keri, and you know what I’m gonna do and why I’m gonna do it.  I just…  I don’t know; I just wanted to let you know, I guess.  It’s bad enough that I’m gonna let myself be the man that Lydecker always wanted me to be; I couldn’t also feel like I was being sneaky about it, like I was trying to keep it all from you.  So this is your heads-up, Max.  I only hope that when I die, if there _is_ something that comes after, that you forgive me for what I’m about to do.”

 

\-------------------------

 

            He picked the perfect time to strike,_ Alec fumed as he struggled to focus on the task at hand.  Every time he thought about White, he was reminded of why he needed to hunt him down and kill him.  Thinking about that prompted unwelcome memories of Max, of the ruin White had made of her body, of the bloodbath White had left for him to find.  He fought to regain control of the involuntary reaction of his nervous system to the all-too-familiar memory that made every Manticore-inflicted trauma pale in comparison.  He focused on his heart rate, consciously ordering it to slow; he took a deep breath, willing his breathing to settle into a more relaxed rhythm; he wiped the sweat from his brow and lied to himself, silently making the case that it was simply too hot in his hotel room._

He picked the perfect time to strike, _Alec thought again, trying to get his mind to stay on task, to allow some modicum of logic and deductive reasoning to complement his primal fury.  _I don’t believe anyone could be that lucky, so the only logical conclusion is that he had Max under surveillance.  He attacked her at home, so whether or not he followed her everywhere she went, he was at least watching her apartment.  I guess that’s as good a starting point as any.

_            Alec went over to Max’s home, ignoring the yellow police tape ordering him to stay out.  The doorframe had been shattered by White’s entry, but the cops had secured the door with a latch and a padlock.  Alec made short work of picking that and then, only after a Herculean effort, willed himself into the crime scene.  The heavy scent of blood had grown stale, practically gagging the transgenic as he cursed the advantage of heightened olfactory senses.  He averted his eyes from the familiar surroundings as much as he could, hoping that might help him pretend the now brown and caked blood splatter belonged to some random, unfortunate stranger._

_            He made his way over to the window – the one where a small piece of gray tissue, once spongy but now resembling dried-up clay, was held fast to the frame by a large spot of blood.  Alec took another deep breath, trying to steel his resolve, but he felt the room start to spin.  He realized immediately that there was no way he would be able to fight off the sudden wave of nausea, so he simply dashed to the bathroom, barely managing to reach the toilet before he regurgitated the sour-smelling, partially digested bourbon and cheese-fries he’d had the night before.  It wasn’t until several minutes of dry heaves later that the transgenic felt capable of standing and walking back into the living room.  He wiped down the bowl and flushed away the evidence that anyone had been there, and then went back to work._

_            The apartment had three windows, all along the west side of the building.  Alec smiled as he remembered Max explaining how she’d purposely selected an apartment with no east-facing windows; on the rare occasions she actually fell asleep, she hated sunlight streaming in and waking her prematurely._

Okay, so if I were White, I’d want a vantage point that allowed me to look through all three windows at once,_ Alec decided, pushing away thoughts of his lost friend_.  He’d have to see as much of the place as possible if he were going to make sure that she was alone before he attacked.  _Alec pulled a small telescope from his pocket and began to scan the skyline spread out before him.  A quick estimate told him he was looking at thousands of windows that might fit his initial criterion.  _Okay, time to trim the field a bit….  He’d have to be close,_ Alec decided as he mentally crossed out the buildings that were more than five blocks away.  _After all, he couldn’t be sure he’d have much time to get the job done.  The last thing he needed was to waste valuable seconds just getting here.

_            The transgenic continued to scan the surroundings, deciding that he could also eliminate the three office buildings that were in his five-block radius.  _He wouldn’t want to be watching from someplace where he might be noticed.  So I’m looking at apartment buildings and hotels…  No, I’m _only_ looking at hotels,_ Alec concluded, deciding to play a hunch._  The last thing White needs is attention, and that’s what he might get in an apartment building.  There’s always the chance of some nosy neighbor taking an interest in him, or simply noticing something unusual about him.  Hotels, by their very nature, are impersonal.  People almost go out of their way not to notice each other.  _Taking his time, scanning far more carefully, Alec picked out five hotels that fit all of his criteria._

            Just one of those five,_ Alec decided, feeling a strange calm descend upon him.  _I can’t imagine he’s still there, but someone will remember him, someone will point me in the right direction.  He won’t get away this time.

 


End file.
